Why Raw milk?

One of the things we do is only drink raw milk. I was buying Organic Milk but after doing a little research realized this is a big waste of money. Most of the 'organic dairys' aren't instead they are just green washed (but more about that later) but you still pay a premium for a useless white liquid. It took a while but I have found raw milk from a local man near San Antonio. It was not easy to find him but so worth it. Plus Raw milk is SO tasty and I can rest in the fact that my kiddos (those who can drink milk) are getting the best.

Some tips for you: if you can only go to the farm once a month for instance remember you can always freeze milk. I prefer to do so in Mason jars and then thaw them as needed. You can also skim the cream off the top and make butter or other goodies. I haven't tried this yet but it is on my list.


This is an excerpt from an article from mercola.com. For the complete article and video click here.
Here is a good place to start if you want to find Raw milk in your area. Don't forget to check your local farmer's markets too. That is where I found the farmer I get our Raw milk from.

Raw Milk is a Healthful, Living Food

High quality raw milk has a mountain of health benefits that pasteurized milk lacks. For example, raw milk is:

• Loaded with healthy bacteria that are good for your gastrointestinal tract
• Full of more than 60 digestive enzymes, growth factors, and immunoglobulins (antibodies)
• Rich in conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), which fights cancer
• Rich in beneficial raw fats, amino acids, and proteins in a highly bioavailable form, all 100 percent digestible
• Loaded with vitamins (A, B, C, D, E, and K) in highly bioavailable forms, and a very balanced blend of minerals (calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, iron) whose absorption is enhanced by live lactobacilli

It is not uncommon for people who drink raw milk to experience improvement or complete resolution of troubling health issues—everything from allergies to digestive problems to eczema. It is also common for people who have "milk allergies" to tolerate raw milk just fine. Pasteurized milk is a completely different story.

Pasteurization Creates a Dead, White Liquid That is NOT Beneficial to Your Health

Pasteurization turns milk into a dead white liquid whose health benefits are largely destroyed. Consider what pasteurization does to milk:

• The price of killing the pathogenic bacteria is that you also kill the good bacteria which helps digest milk and make it such a nourishing food
• Proteins and enzymes are completely destroyed or denatured, made less digestible and less usable by your body
• Immunoglobulins, metal-binding proteins, vitamin-binding proteins, carrier proteins, growth factors, and anti-microbial peptides such as Lactoferrin are destroyed
• Many vitamins and minerals are rendered biologically unusable
• Fats are damaged and destabilized

Additionally, the bacteria killed by pasteurization are not removed, so their dead carcasses remain in the milk to ignite immune reactions in those who ingest them, which is one major cause of milk allergies. It isn't really an allergy to the milk itself, but to the organic cell fragments it contains.
Making matters worse, cows in CAFOs (confined animal feeding operations) are routinely given drugs in an effort to counter the ill health and immune problems caused by their poor living conditions. Feedlots are breeding grounds for all kinds of harmful bacteria. So the cows are snowed with antibiotics. This milk HAS to be pasteurized, because it is simply loaded with bacteria—and not the beneficial kind.
Researchers using a highly sensitive test to determine what drugs and hormones might be present in your pasteurized milk found some startling results. The drugs and hormones they detected included the following:

Anti-inflammatories (niflumic acid, mefenamic acid, ketoprofen, diclofenac, phenylbutazone, naproxen, flunixin, diclofenac)	Antibiotics (florfenicol)	Natural hormones (estrone)
Sex hormones (17-beta-estradiol)	Steroid hormones (17-alpha-ethinylestradiol)	Anti-malaria drugs (pyrimethamine)
Anti-fungal drugs (triclosan)

While all types of milk tested positive for chemicals—even breast milk—cow's milk contained the highest levels. Some of these drugs and hormones were given to the cows directly, while others were likely ingested from the cattle food or contamination on the farm. When you drink raw milk from these massive commercial dairies, you might indeed be risking your health. But this is a far different product than raw milk from smaller farms where the farming practices are more natural, sustainable, clean, and humane. Raw milk from these cows is clean and nutritious and loaded with good bacteria—the kind you need for a healthy gut.

WHO'S Your Dairy?

Why is the CDC still determined to hide the facts and prevent you from access to this beneficial food? If safety isn't the REAL issue, then what is? If raw dairy really caught on, wouldn't the dairy industry simply follow suit and begin producing raw products to meet the demand?
They would if they could, but it would be virtually impossible. In order for conventional dairy farms to produce safe raw milk, they'd be forced to clean up their production practices, raise healthier cows (and likely fewer cows), and give them access to pasture. This would cost them money—and lots of it—if it were even possible…and that's a big "if." Their business DEPENDS on pasteurization, and that is why their powerful lobbyists will stop at nothing to persuade government agencies to keep raw milk bans in full force.
Manipulating or outright lying about statistics is just one means of accomplishing this.
The CDC and others who argue that raw milk is unsafe do not differentiate between REAL raw milk, and raw milk produced under the suboptimal conditions often found in CAFOs. Small dairies that are raising "happy cows" that are allowed to roam on pasture, feed on grass, and are raised without the use of antibiotics and hormones, produce raw milk that is loaded with nutrition and free of pathogenic bacteria and other contaminants, the way milk was produced decades and centuries ago.
The good news is, Big Dairy's worse fear is coming true—raw dairy IS catching on! Raw milk has been gaining popularity for years now.
Take Massachusetts, for example. The number of dairies licensed to sell raw milk grew from 12 to 23 in just two years, while the Northeast Organic Farming Association stated that dairies are selling more raw milk than they were five or six years ago, and consumers are calling in increasing numbers looking for advice on where to find it. The conventional dairy industry, realizing this, has redoubled their efforts to stifle raw milk sales, making every effort to prevent it from becoming mainstream, where it could begin to threaten their very livelihoods.