rawmilkandrubberboots

Now before you call me crazy and hit the Back button or slap your laptop shut in disgust the title is quite valid, to a certain point.

The birth date of trans fats can be linked back to the beginning of the Industrial Revolution when new methods were used to make cooking oils.  Without boring you with the chemistry behind this I’ll simply say it has to do with the placement of two hydrogen atoms around two carbon atoms.  The natural placement is side by side (aka. cis-bonds), but the high temperature created in the oil making process knocks one of these hydrogen atoms “across the street”, leaving its next door neighbour.

So why are trans fats bad?  Simply put, it’s because our bodies do not know how to attack this movement, which causes a whole host of diseases.  This is what science and marketing gurus have been preaching to us for the last few years.

You may be thinking I’ve just trumped myself by proving in actual fact that trans fats ARE bad for us!  Keep your cool here comes my beef about trans fats.  Consider that last sentence foreshadowing.

Before the time of the Industrial Revolution, Mother Nature was millions of years ahead of the game.  Ruminants.  These special creatures include: deer, elk, moose, cattle, sheep, goats, etc.  and what sets these animals apart from other mammals is the fact they are a huge walking fermenter turning grass into food for humans.

The fermenter (rumen) of the animal acts like the oil press, it takes fatty acids (in particular linoleic and linolenic acid) and adds hydrogen until it is completely saturated.  This process known as biohydrogenation, with one of the by-products being a trans-fat called conjugated linoleic acid (CLA).  This natural trans-fat is no more like its artificial counterpart than chaulk is like cheese.  CLA has been linked to lowering cholesterol, decreasing the incidence of heart disease and some types of cancer, and acts as a powerful antioxidant.  Sounds like something worth eating!

Now where would one find CLA in everyday dining?  Pick anything that comes from cattle: yogurt, cheese, milk, meat, and butter NOT margarine (a blog for another day).

The proof is out there.  While marketing has twisted your opinion of trans fats (with good reason for the artificial trans fats), they have neglected to point out some trans fats may have such an impact on your life like preventing chronic, often fatal, diseases.

My beef about on the misconceptions about beef has been unveiled before your eyes.  Agricultural “myth buster” 1—The Powers to Be 0.

When you were a kid (if you’re an adult now that is) a common question asked to you was ‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ most children will shout the stereotypic “policeman”, “doctor”, “fire truck!”, “hockey player” some derivative thereof.  My reply was the first of the stereotypic responses of the pre-pubertal youth, even today I get “stupid” (according to the better half) when a police car rushes down our street.

The further into my grade schooling the more I fell in love with sciences, especially biological sciences.  After a brief layover on the pharmacy bandwagon my choice swayed to my love for animals.  I wanted to be a veterinarian.

After my high school graduation I packed up and left for agricultural college.  Huh, imagine that… the outport boy from Newfoundland going to an AGRICULTURAL college!  The closest I’d ever been to a cow was the 2% milk sitting in the fridge.

Well here I am, seven years later.  Vet school?! HAHAHAHAHA! NOOOOOOO!  That’s a story for another time, maybe.  I am a graduate student studying dairy nutrition and milk quality.  My head is full of useful/useless information like ’soil is not dirt’ and ‘the tomato is really a berry’.

What on earth would someone like me have to blog about?  Well, I believe that the media has corrupted the non-scientific minds to believe certain things… afterall if it’s on tv is HAS to be true!  Issac Asimov once said “Science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom”, so with that stitched to the sleeve of my coveralls I will slip into my rubber boots and bust the myths of the agricultural world, some of which are buried deep within the scientific journals that litter every surface I’ve come in contact with over that last two years.

So pour up a glass of milk, crack an egg and enjoy the ride!

Party trivia of the day: Did you know that humans are the only mature mammals on the planet that consume milk???

 “What is milk?”  When posed this question I replied, like the innocent lamb being led to slaughter, milk is typically 3.4% fat, 3.5% protein, mostly water and used mainly as sustenance for infant animals.  Thinking I hit the nail on the head with that answer (and surprised I remembered the percentages) I was quickly shot down by an answer that included “casein”, “enzymes”, “fatty acids” and the statement “every farm’s milk is different”.

There is a current movement that promotes the consumption of raw milk in relation to the pasteurized milk sitting in our fridge today.  They say that pasteurizing diminishes the nutritive value and flavour quality of the milk.  Currently (since 1938) in Canada it is illegal to sell and consume raw milk, unless you own the animal that milk comes from.

Now I would be lying to you if I didn’t state that raw milk may (and does) contain bacteria, pathogens, somatic cells, even tuberculosis (though no one has contracted TB from raw milk in half a century) and the list goes on.  However, there is a market for raw milk. 

Just ask Michael Schmidt, an organic dairy farmer in Owen Sound, Ontario about his success and failure when he sold raw milk to customers.  What Mr. Schmidt started was simply ingenious, he didn’t sell the milk to consumers he sold “moo-tual funds” (pardon the pun) whereby consumers were owners of the cows and therefore could drink to their heart’s delight.

This co-operative was brought to a screaming halt by armed officers in November 2006 after a Department of Natural Resources court order was ignored by Mr. Schmidt.  This farmer trying to diversify and create a niche market now faces contempt charges and could face a maximum sentence if convicted.

Albeit there are laws against the consumption of raw milk by regular consumers; having tried it on a few occasions I don’t think I would run and buy a quart of it.  But is this how we treat small businesses that what to take the bull (or cow) by the horns and get out of the mainstream?

Governments should be trying to help these farmers, if not in a monetary way in a consultation manner, whereby they offer advice as to different alternatives (i.e. pasture-fed milk, cold-pasteurization) that may be available to help their business diversify.

I am happy there are farmers in this country like Mr. Schmidt who are seeing the potential to grow, and are not easily led like cows going to slaughter.

Got milk?