Milk - book

Milk, The Surprising Story of Milk Through the Ages, Anne Mendelson (Alfred A. Knopf, 2008)

The first third of this book is an interesting, even fascinating account of the use of milk by different peoples, in different parts of the world, at different times in history. The remaining two-thirds consists of recipes which, I confess, I only briefly perused, partly because most of them require the use of milk in forms that I know I will never obtain. Her account of different kinds of milk, different ways of processing milk, and what happens to milk when processed is a bit technical but it is not difficult to at least understand the basics involved. She describes how it is that not only has milk been changed by modern demands for it, but even how the cows themselves have been changed. A family Jersey Cow, for example, could provide milk for up to twenty years, the average life of a dairy cow under modern factory farming conditions lasts for three years before becoming hamburger. Basically, Mendelson does for milk what others have done for most of the other foods we consume in industrialized nations. It is not a very happy story, especially for those like herself, who obviously love milk and its products.

I was somewhat amazed to learn that prior to Columbus there was no tradition of milking in the Americas. I was even more amazed to learn that the way we consume milk here in what she describes as a sort of “Northwestern Cow Belt” is, in traditional and historic terms really rather aberrant. The use of milk as a beverage, for example, is virtually unknown in the rest of the world. This is partly because it is only in this northwestern region that adults are for the most part lactose tolerant, but it is also, as she carefully details, because of the way cattle, sheep, goats, camels, and buffalo are raised, and the environments where they are raised. In harsh and dry environments milk from cattle is not practical, and milk from the other milk-producing beasts predominates. And also, without refrigeration, milk does not keep well and is manufactured into cheese, yogurt, and such. Mendelson discusses the differences in milk from different animals, the different amounts produced, the different cheeses and other milk products produced, and different cultural practices surrounding the use of milk in its various forms. She bemoans the fact that so many of these traditional practices are being lost and urges the reader to employ them, if, in fact, they can find milk in a pristine enough form to even attempt it.

In her analysis of milk and its history she discusses different ways of pasteurization, homogenization, and other treatments of this basic substance so necessary for human life, and concludes that while milk can be made to keep longer, taste differently, contain more or less butterfat, and be shaped for the marketplace, this has done nothing to make it a better or more nutritious food. She reviews how our demand and taste for milk has been sculpted by medical beliefs about its value and advertising touting claims about the benefits of milk that have not necessarily always been true. This is not truly a polemic about the horrors of milk as we now know it and consume it, but, rather, a factual-based account of how this has all come about and why it is not necessarily all for the better. I found it of interest, but as I am not a true aficionado when it comes to milk (as I suspect it was related to a kidney stone I once experienced), I believe many will find it of greater interest than I did. I should think that for those who devour books on food (as I do) this one should find its place on the shelf alongside Bread and Oil, Salt, Codfish, Olives, Pepper, Shad, Wheat, Caviar, Saffron, Charcuterie, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, and so on.