My new car - and my other new car

I drove my Prius for nearly 200,000 miles, longest I have ever driven any car. It was very useful on the farm. I hauled hay and straw in it, during greenhouse season I could squeeze 17 flats of plants in it. More than one newborn calf took a ride in that car. I got it stuck in fields, had to pull it out of the mud more than once with the tractor. And I hauled milk to the farmers market, where the shareholders picked it up. Occasionally there was a spill. But it soldiered on.

I finally traded it in after moving to town. The guy at the garage told me gently that the car had some odor issues. Oh, really? LOL

I had done my research, and I bought a VW Jetta, diesel, SEL, which was the top of the line. I loved it. On the highway, it got 57 mpg on one trip to Rockford to visit my grandson and his family. It loved to go fast, and the faster I drove, the better the gas mileage!

I had owned it about six weeks when the news hit. VW had deliberately programmed their diesel cars so that they sensed when they were in a testing station, and emissions all met standards. Once the car was on the road, the computer sensed that they were NOT in a test station and reprogrammed the car to run like a deer and get great mileage. They were also producing between 10 and 40 times the allowable amount of nitrogen oxides. That's smog, and that's what irritates lungs.

In Indiana, where we can boast having the worst air in the nation, there are no emission tests for automobiles, of course, so I could have kept driving my car. But being a tree hugging progressive, and remembering a granddaughter with asthma when she was a baby, how could I keep the car, no matter how much I loved it? So I opted to sell my car back to VW.

The local dealer didn't have much choice on the lot for a replacement car, but there was one I fell in love with. I could have waited until I got my refund and bought a different make of car, but I had driven a dog (let's face it, you don't buy a Prius for a power trip) for six years, and my Jetta was fun to drive. So I bought a 2016 Jetta GLI, 2.0 liter engine, drove even better than the 2015 diesel! It sat in my garage, in storage, to keep the insurance down, until the VW dealer pointed out to me that if I wrecked the 2015, which I was continuing to drive, it would no longer be eligible for the buyback program, and even if I was not at fault in the event such an accident should occur, the car would be valued at book, which ain't much, thanks to VW's chicanery. So the diesel went into the garage in storage, and the new 2016 GLI came out. The VW buyback program accounted for the loss in value, and we are being compensated quite well for that difference.

My appointment to return the 2015 diesel Jetta is January 18. I will finally be able to put the new car in the garage. I never dreamed I would own two brand new cars within 15 months of one another. But as of January 18, this single person household will finally be a single car household again.

GLI waiting for its turn in the garage

Food and health

I've been thinking about food and health.  We all have our opinions - low carb, low fat, grass fed meat, raw milk, no dairy, vegetarian, vegan - the list goes on and on.  And everyone can find plenty of "data" to back up their opinions.  Dr. Weston A. Price (my food guru) studied long lived peoples all over the world, and something that stood out was that healthy indigenous peoples ate copious amounts of fat (no polyunsaturated fat), raw milk and fermented food /soaked grains.  And when these healthy people were introduced to our Western diet, full of sugar and processed foods, they became ill.  So it sounds like a pretty resounding endorsement for upping our fat intake and cutting out sugar, both of which I have done.

However (and isn't there always a "however"?), even though this old body just can't tolerate sugar and carbohydrates in general, I know people who can, who remain slim in spite of indulging in potatoes and apples, who don't suffer from depression after eating a couple of cookies, who don't have to use lettuce in place of bread when making a sandwich, and who don't make their pizza dough out of shredded cheese and eggs.  (Yup, I do that, and it is REALLY good.)

I know one woman who couldn't wait to get out of her household as a teenager so she wouldn't be forced to eat meat anymore; can't stand it, hasn't eaten a bite of it since leaving for college.  She is slim, energetic and healthy.  So there you have it.  No single magic bullet so far as food and health are concerned.

I'm thinking, "Perhaps it is something else altogether."  Are there other reasons, such as the Western lifestyle that goes with the Western diet?  I was in the bookstore perusing cookbooks.  And I was thinking of how many famous cooks live to a ripe old age.

• James Beard - died at 82, and he ate plenty of bread!
• Julia Child - died at 92, and ate plenty of butter
• François Massialot - died at 77 in the 18th century, French chef and cookbook author 
• Georges Auguste Escoffier - died at 88 in the 20th century
•  Prosper Montagne - died at 83 in 1948, author of Larousse gastronomique
• Jacques Pépin - 77 and still going strong

I'm having a hard time finding a truly fine chef who checked out early from poor health.

What do/did they have in common?  They ate well.  The ingredients were good, the methods of cooking were good, and the end result was a feast for the eyes and the nose as well as the taste buds.  And they were doing what they loved - including loving to eat.

The age-old question "Do you eat to live or live to eat?" seems to imply, at least to me, that perhaps some of us, such as I, are too focused on food, that the healthiest among us just eat when hungry, when it is time, and eat what is available in the fridge and cupboard.

I am rethinking that attitude of mine - perhaps it is the "live to eat" part that is the most important.  I love to cook.  I love to shop for food.  I am so delighted that I work at the Farmers Market in South Bend, and belong to Purple Porch, and live on a certified organic farm so that I can eat my own grass fed meat, drink raw milk, make my own cheese, eat eggs from free range chickens.   Food is a daily delight in my life.

Yup, I live to eat, and I think perhaps that is a good thing!  And I love what I do to earn my living - very much associated with food.  Now it is time to cook another great breakfast - bacon from Berkshire pigs raised right here on organic feed, eggs collected yesterday from my friends the hens, a cup of espresso, and some thick and luscious kefir made from raw milk from cows I am looking at.

Bon appetit.  

Changing my mind

I said I was going to make a batch of Cheddar yesterday, but I'm making Cheddar again next Sunday, when I have a few friends (and serious foodies) coming over to learn how to make their own Cheddar, including building a cheap but effective cheese press.  So I decided to try Gruyere, the queen of the melting cheeses.

It requires much higher temperatures, I noticed, and the curds are stirred and held at 114º, which is quite hot - in fact so hot that I could see the cheese beginning to melt in places.  Hmmmm, should have been warned!  Anyway, I followed the recipe faithfully, or at least I thought I did.  It said to warm the mold before adding the warm curds, wrapped in cheesecloth.  And it was a very short draining time.  That meant that the curds really didn't have a chance to cool off before the lid went down on the mold.  It was to be pressed at medium pressure for just an hour and then redressed before the final 12-hour press with a little added weight.

Redressing means that you take it out of the mold, unwrap the cheesecloth from the curds, which now form the block of cheese, flip the cheese so that what was the top is now the bottom, and wrap it in the cheesecloth again.  Then back into the mold.  Sometimes one does this several times, but for this cheese, at least in this recipe book, it was one flip and on to the final press.

HOWEVER, when I took it out of the mold, the cheese had melted into the cheesecloth, a little like bubble gum on your kid's new shirt.  Sigh . . .

Not one to give up easily, I just flipped the chunk of curds, now well knit together, without removing the cheesecloth, then smoothed the cheesecloth as best I could and popped it back into the mold.  It stayed there overnight. 

This morning I foolishly hoped that it would have shrunk and dried a bit and the cheesecloth would release.   It was better, but there was no way I was going to get that cheesecloth off without destroying half the wheel of cheese. 

What do you do when your kid gets gum on his new shirt?  Put it in the freezer!  So that's what I did, setting it in the chest freezer in the garage for about 20 minutes.  Voila! the cheesecloth came off fairly well, although it doesn't have the nice smooth surface I would have liked.  It got its 12-hour bath in brine, and I just took it out to put on the drying board for a few days before it goes into the cheese cave.  This is a washed rind type of cheese, no wax.  I am not pleased with the cracks I see - that's a great place for mold to form where I don't want it to.  The mold creates the rind and should just be on the exterior.  So I think this batch is not going to be my long aged Gruyere that I was planning on.

I sliced a bit off to see what it would taste like without aging, and I must say that it is quite fantastic.  But it will spoil quickly, will probably have to be eaten within a couple of weeks.  I'm having company Saturday night, and a house guest who will be here until Tuesday, so perhaps we will take care of it completely before the sun rises Wednesday morning. 

The continuing saga of the raw milk wars

It was bound to happen.  The St. Joe Department of Health stopped at my booth at the Farmers Market and asked if I was selling raw milk.  I told her I was not.  She said she heard I was.  I told her we had an association that owned the cows.  She said, "Oh, you are one of THOSE!"

I said we most certainly were NOT one of those, that it wasn't just a sham to go through a loophole in the law, that we were wholly owned and operated by the shareholders.  I explained that I did not hold title to the cows, but was just a shareholder like everyone else.  I asked her if the person who complained about me had been forced to drink raw milk.  She said, "No."  I asked, "Then shouldn't she have just minded her own business?"  What was she trying to save me and the other shareholders from?  Good health, perhaps?

Then she said that I couldn't distribute it at the market anymore.  I asked why.  She said there was a law against distributing raw milk.  I asked her what that law was.  She couldn't give me any information about it.  I asked her for a copy of the law.  That was two or three weeks ago.  I am still waiting.  Our lawyer has checked on this.  There is no such law.  This is nothing more than intimidation.

When talking to this official at my booth, I recited my mantra.

Since 1992:

Deaths from raw milk  - 2
Deaths from radish sprouts - 3
Deaths from spinach - 5
Deaths from pasteurized milk - 620

At that point, I asked her why she wasn't at the local supermarkets trying to stop them from distributing those other "deadly" foods.  No answer of course.

Then I pointed out that since 1992, approximately 7,225,000 people have died from cigarette smoke.  I asked her why she was bothering me - seemed there were a lot bigger health issues out there.

I will give her credit for this - she said, "I guess I need to do some research."  Yes, she certainly does.

It will be interesting to see where this goes.

The bias against raw milk.

Eighteen people in southern Michigan recently became ill with campylobacter.  All 18 of them had drunk raw milk from a CSA that gets their milk from a farmer in Middlebury, IN.   "CSA" stands for Community Supported Agriculture.  The CSA members are shareholders in the dairy herd that provides the milk, and so can legally drink milk from their own cows.

There are 900 families in this CSA, representing a few thousand people who drink this milk.  Let's say that each family consists on average of three people.  That is 2700 people getting this milk.  Eighteen people got campylobacter.  Two thousand six hundred and eighty-two of them didn't.  The milk was immediately tested.  It tested negative for campylobacter.

As usual, the government inspectors, in all of their wisdom, said, "It's the raw milk.  Case closed."  Even though there was no campylobacter in the milk, even though the vast majority of the people who drank this milk remained healthy, it had to be the milk.

Of the 18 people who were ill, eleven of them attended a potluck where Caesar Salad, made with raw egg, was served.  No eggs were tested.  As I said, the case was closed, the culprit identified, and no official looked any further.  It is said that as many as 70% of supermarket chickens contain campylobacter.  We all know to cook chicken thoroughly, but what if the cutting board isn't properly cleaned and then is used to cut up an onion for a salad, or a knife is accidentally used without being thoroughly washed after touching raw chicken?  None of those things were looked into.

Between 1990 and 2004, a CSPI (Center for Science in the Public Interest) report shows a much greater risk from consuming the following foods:

31,496 illnesses, 639 outbreaks from produce (38%)
16,280 illnesses, 541 outbreaks from poultry (20%)
13,220 illnesses, 467 outbreaks from beef (16%)
11,027 illnesses, 341 outbreaks from eggs (13%)
9,969 illnesses, 984 outbreaks from seafood (12%)

And yet raw milk remains the "problem child."  

Here are some more statistics I looked up after this latest attack on raw milk.  I was interviewed by a local TV station, I read these statistics during the interview, and they were ignored of course.  Why did I think it would be any different?  Anyway, chew on these figures.

Since 1992, here are some causes of death in the US.

Raw milk - 2
Radish sprouts - 3
Spinach - 5
PASTEURIZED milk - 620
Automobile accidents - About 680,000
Alcohol related illnesses - About 300,000
Alcohol related accidents, homicides and suicides (some of these are included in auto accidents) - About 400,000
Deaths related to smoking - About 7,225,000

If you are worried about drinking raw milk because you think it might kill you, I will ask if you are driving a car, if you smoke or spend time around people who are smoking, if you take a drink every now and then.  I will also ask if you are eating produce, poultry, beef, eggs and seafood. And finally, are you consuming pasteurized milk, spinach and radish sprouts?  If you can answer "no" to all of these questions, then I suppose maybe you had better stay away from raw milk.

Now I am going to the kitchen and having my morning glass of homemade raw milk kefir.  Ah, the stuff of life!