Fresh Abundance Weekly News - May 9th, 2009

Fresh Abundance
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Milk 101: The Skinny on Pasteurization, Homogenization, and Dating of Milk

This week we added Spokane Family Farm's HTST Pasteurized Non Homogenized milk to our product line. The animals feed is conventionally grown, but all sourced locally. Spokane Family Farm's milk is available for home delivery or in-store at $4.29/gallon and $2.79/half gallon. Because there are so many milk options on the market, this seemed like the perfect time to explore our options.

PASTEURIZATION
Pasteurization is not intended to kill all pathogenic micro-organisms so even pasteurized milk has beneficial buggies.

HTST (Pasteurization) requires heating milk to 145 degrees for half an hour. This milk has a shorter date stamp. Organic Valley stamps this milk 18 days from the day it is bottled. This one works well for cheese making but people tend not to buy it because they are looking for the longest dated milk.

UHT (Ultra Pasteurization) requires using heat and pressure to reach 280 degrees for a few minutes. This milk has a longer date stamped on the carton. Organic Valley stamps a date 56 days from the day it was bottled.

UHT (Flash Pasteurization) kills the most stuff. This is the milk you will find in aseptic containers sitting on the grocery shelf.

Raw Milk is not pasteurized or homogenized at all; it is straight from the cow or goat, cooled quickly, and date stamped (9 days for raw cows milk, 21 days for raw goats milk). Raw milk does not go rotten, it just sours, which has been used for its human health effects since humans have been using milk.

HOMOGENIZATION
Fat is less dense than water so cream (fat) floats above the watery part of the milk, naturally. Homogenization forces the cream (fat) to stay combined with the watery part by exposing the milk to high pressure, turbulence, and shock waves. When milk is homogenized, it MUST be pasteurized, as it goes rancid very quickly. On the other hand, HTST Pasteurized milk does not NEED to be homogenized because it won't separate as the enzymes are not destroyed as much because only light pasteurization is used. Spokane Family Farm's milk falls into this category. It is Pasteurized Non Homogenized, and can still be used for cheese making. UHT Ultra Pasteurized milk is ALWAYS homogenized to mix in the unsightly dead sludge that would form at the bottom of the carton without homogenization (out of sight out of mind). Making cheese with UHT Ultra Pasteurized milk will not work as there are not enough live enzymes remaining to grow.

If you want to learn more about homogenization and pasteurization, check out wikipedia. If you would like me to cover a specific product or chemical, send me an email brightspirit@freshabundance.com

At Fresh Abundance, we would rather carry HTST Organic Valley milk but our members have continuously requested the longest dated milk, so we currently carry the "bad" UHT Organic Valley milk. Tell us what you want, we care. As for me and my kids, we have moved to the local stuff only. I find it telling that you can't make cheese with UHT milk because basically, it is too dead. I try to limit how much "dead food" I eat, which to me means seriously altered or nutrient deprived food. I believe the movement back to live food is the next back to the past movment that will hit our food habits. Our bodies are alive so our food should be too. I love the idea that I share my body with millions of helpful buggies that work hard to keep me healthy.

EVENTS CALENDAR
May 16th from 11-4 Help us raise funds by visiting the PEACH Farm and get your garden bedding plants. This is a great family outing. Get a peak at the cutting edge permaculture farming happening right here in Spokane. The farm is located at 3324 S. Best Rd. Phone 924-7774. Take I-90 East to Evergreen Exit, head south to 32nd Ave, take a left, go 1/2 mile farm is on the right.

May 17th 10 AM Organic Gardening Class
Offered at Community Roots Market and back by popular demand, Soils 101: How
to care for your soil community and harvest the best tasting veggies. $10
Suggested Donation

May 17th from 11-4 Community Roots Market
your All Things LOCAL market
Click on this link to find out who will be vending at the market

PEACH BEDDING PLANTS
Starting Monday, May 11, P.E.A.C.H. bedding plants will be for available at all of our stores. These plants are a fundraiser for our tax exempt non-profit P.E.A.C.H.-People for Environmental Action & Community Health. These plants were tended by kids from Juvenile Justice who got in trouble and had to do community service, and also by folks participating in our states welfare to work program. We provide a work site, respect and education on how to grow food for these low-income members of our community.

All our plants are non-GMO, chemical free and raised with love.

$3 per pot or pony

WEEKLY PRODUCE SALES
Organic Fancy Lemons $1.99/Pound
Organic Red Leaf & Green Leaf Lettuce $1.69/Each
Organic Gold Pineapple $1.59/Pound
Organic Red & Green Cabbage $.99/Pound

As you might have noticed we are now sending out a paper copy of the weekly news. We will have more info in the weekly paper copy then the email version but you are free to opt out of paper weekly news if that feel right to you. To opt out please send an email to Sheri, our member care specialist at orders@freshabundance.com

Till Next Week Stay LOCAL,
Eden Brightspirit Hendrix