Just curious if anyone knows what this could be. In speaking with a friend today about my upcoming cheese, milk plans..she said she'd just read a travel blog where the guy got sick from eating cheese in a French village? She didn't remember what they said was the problem, other than it was not pasteurized. Are some people allergic to non pasteurized milk and cheese? I'd always read that done *properly* it was better for us, especially those of us with arthritis issues.
Views: 67
You need to be a member of Nigerian Dwarf Dairy Goats to add comments!
Interesting! One of the cheeses I'd love to learn how to make is feta. Opa!
It's a really good thing we're all doing this now. I read a "fun fact" in our Farm Service Bulletin (or somewhere), that the "average" U.S. small farmer right now is.....a 76 year old woman! I certainly hope the conglomerates don't have their way with the laws restricting everything (except of course if you are a multi million corporation with attorneys on staff)!
I took a cheese-making class at the Western Dairy Center in Utah. One of the cheeses that we made was feta, which tasted pretty decent after only a couple of days of brining. Then the instructor brought out a feta that had been aging in brine for a year. Although it was, not surprisingly, quite salty, the flavour was crazy-intense!
And for a random cheese fact, we were told that in Europe the brine for feta is frequently reused with more salt & water added as needed. The other cultures that build up in the brine give the cheese a flavour distinct to the particular cheese-maker. When the cheese-maker chooses to go out of business the brines can sell for very large amounts of money.
The law regarding raw milk is a little confusing -- fresh cheese, such as chevre, which Marin will be selling, are required to be pasteurized. If cheese is aged at least 90 days (or maybe it's 120?), it can be made from raw milk in the U.S. -- at this time! The FDA is trying to make all raw milk products illegal, so this could change. With the aged cheeses, however, I will also add that the older it is, the better it tastes! We opened one of our one-year-old cheddars a couple weeks ago, and WOW! We're milking a lot more goats than we need now, but I'm totally okay with making lots of aged cheeses, because they just keep getting better and better. I'd love to be eating my own cheese someday that is several years old! Most of the cheddar, gouda, colby, etc., that we eat now is only about six months old.
Thank you both! We decided that whatever had caused it, if it were the cheese that it probably wasn't handled the way it should've been. That's interesting that the law requires it to be pasteurized. I hadn't read up on it, as we want it only for our own use.
I know that a goat saved my mother's life when she was born and couldn't handle cow's milk. I'm hoping it will be easier on my stomach, too.
It was good seeing the butter video Rachael posted, I love fresh butter, and it doesn't look hard to do, either.
Contamination of raw milk can occur and is what most often causes illness. Listeria monocytogenes is one of the more concerning bacteria:
"The source of L. monocytogenes in raw milk is mostly the gastrointestinal tract of animals and the environment, skin of the teats, in particular (Harvey and Gilmour, 1992; Sanaa et al., 1996). Shedding of Listeria into milk due to chronic mastitis (O’Donnell, 1995) is less frequent." From http://www.vri.cz/docs/vetmed/49-7-243.pdf
Proper pasteurization will kill listeria, but recontamination from improperly cleaned equipment can occur. Listeria has caused several significant listeriosis outbreaks over the past few years in both Canada and the US, although it has generally been associated with meats.
E. coli can also cause illness as can salmonella. There are several others. Pasteurization was originally started up to prevent the spread of bovine tuberculosis into humans via cow's milk.
We use our goat milk raw for household use as I trust our sanitation and have healthy goats, but we are setting up a farmstead cheese-making operation and I will be legally required to pasteurize. Even if I weren't legally required to I would still do it. We're investing a lot of money in this and I'm not willing to risk it all just for raw milk.
As a side note, I'm only going to be making chevre for sale this year. If I start making aged cheeses at some point in the future then I could use raw milk as long as the cheese has aged at least 90 days before I sell it. The aging process changes the pH of the cheese and drops the moisture content to such a point that the bacteria are unable to survive.
I don't really know the answer, but I would think he most likely got sick from something besides the cheese, or if it WAS the cheese, that it was because it got contaminated, and not because it wasn't pasteurized. Some people are allergic to milk and cheese. It's not chemically changed into something better or less allergenic for you once it's pasteurized, other than it's killed bacteria both good and bad. In fact, a lot of people think that non pasteurized milk HELPS their allergies. If you are handling your milk properly when you collect it, you shouldn't have bad bacterias. Pasteurizing is something that large facilities started employing because it made it easier to get by with "OK" dairy practices and not sicken people. At least that's my take on it.
Replies
Interesting! One of the cheeses I'd love to learn how to make is feta. Opa!
It's a really good thing we're all doing this now. I read a "fun fact" in our Farm Service Bulletin (or somewhere), that the "average" U.S. small farmer right now is.....a 76 year old woman! I certainly hope the conglomerates don't have their way with the laws restricting everything (except of course if you are a multi million corporation with attorneys on staff)!
I took a cheese-making class at the Western Dairy Center in Utah. One of the cheeses that we made was feta, which tasted pretty decent after only a couple of days of brining. Then the instructor brought out a feta that had been aging in brine for a year. Although it was, not surprisingly, quite salty, the flavour was crazy-intense!
And for a random cheese fact, we were told that in Europe the brine for feta is frequently reused with more salt & water added as needed. The other cultures that build up in the brine give the cheese a flavour distinct to the particular cheese-maker. When the cheese-maker chooses to go out of business the brines can sell for very large amounts of money.
I'm really interested in aged cheeses... I've only made Chavre which was DELICIOUS, but it's all I've done.
Not all states require pasteurization. If they do, then my local health food store is breaking the law by selling raw milk cheese.
and did you see in the comments in that video thread, that Deborah doesn't even bother to separate? Even BETTER!! lol
Thank you both! We decided that whatever had caused it, if it were the cheese that it probably wasn't handled the way it should've been. That's interesting that the law requires it to be pasteurized. I hadn't read up on it, as we want it only for our own use.
I know that a goat saved my mother's life when she was born and couldn't handle cow's milk. I'm hoping it will be easier on my stomach, too.
It was good seeing the butter video Rachael posted, I love fresh butter, and it doesn't look hard to do, either.
Contamination of raw milk can occur and is what most often causes illness. Listeria monocytogenes is one of the more concerning bacteria:
"The source of L. monocytogenes in raw milk is mostly the gastrointestinal tract of animals and the environment, skin of the teats, in particular (Harvey and Gilmour, 1992; Sanaa et al., 1996). Shedding of Listeria into milk due to chronic mastitis (O’Donnell, 1995) is less frequent." From http://www.vri.cz/docs/vetmed/49-7-243.pdf
Proper pasteurization will kill listeria, but recontamination from improperly cleaned equipment can occur. Listeria has caused several significant listeriosis outbreaks over the past few years in both Canada and the US, although it has generally been associated with meats.
E. coli can also cause illness as can salmonella. There are several others. Pasteurization was originally started up to prevent the spread of bovine tuberculosis into humans via cow's milk.
We use our goat milk raw for household use as I trust our sanitation and have healthy goats, but we are setting up a farmstead cheese-making operation and I will be legally required to pasteurize. Even if I weren't legally required to I would still do it. We're investing a lot of money in this and I'm not willing to risk it all just for raw milk.
As a side note, I'm only going to be making chevre for sale this year. If I start making aged cheeses at some point in the future then I could use raw milk as long as the cheese has aged at least 90 days before I sell it. The aging process changes the pH of the cheese and drops the moisture content to such a point that the bacteria are unable to survive.