from the website of Dungeness Valley Creamery in Washington state
Testimonials
I am an Engineer in the Seattle area with an interest in Olympic lifting and strength training. A couple of years ago when I was introduced to strength training, I had to make some changes to my diet to ensure that the benefit of my 3 training days a week was maximized. Instead of taking steroids I started drinking 1 gallon of milk a day, I didn't change anything else I just started drinking 1 gallon of milk a day. Some people thought I was crazy, but what they didn't know was that before the popularity of steroids, food supplements and protein drinks, it was very common for 'lifters' to drink milk and lift heavy weights. This is what I did, and I drank raw milk. The reason I drank raw milk, was that I didn't want to put something that wasn't pure in to my body, I was drinking so much milk that I figured that just a trace of hormones or other unnatural impurities would add up. Also, I became a connoisseur of milk I tried several different varieties and the raw milk just tasted the best. After staggering myself up to 1 gallon a day, I found it was the most agreeable variety to my body too. And during the 3 month period that I was drinking the raw milk I stayed healthy and I didn't get sick once, yes I didn't get sick or injured once and I was able to keep muscle fatigue subdued.
The results of the strength training program were astonishing. My lifts increased by 40%, my dead lift increased to 210kg, my squat increased to 190kg and my snatch and clean and jerk increased dramatically too. Also, I was able to pedal 1 mile on a lemond racing cycle set to the highest setting in less than 4 minutes, there's a video of me doing it on the internet, I broke several other gym records too. My body weight went up from 185Ibs to 225Ibs and after I started introducing more conditioning in to my program back down to 215Ibs, at 215Ibs there was virtually no fat on me.
I'm not a hippy or a weirdo and I'm certainly not a religious person, I'm just somebody that wanted to get strong fast the old school way. Coincidentally I split snatch which is old school and almost unheard of these days too.
Anyway, I'm not arguing that the raw whole milk was the only reason I realized the results I did. However, I would argue it was an important contributor and it certainly did not have a negative effect on my health....
Oh and one other thing several other people in my gym did exactly the same thing with similar results....
~James
================
Real milk: A personal account
Nadine Ijaz, National Post Published: Monday, January 25, 2010
I am on chocolate, but Thursday morning I was nervous enough to drink a full litre of homemade hot cocoa. Organic fairly traded cocoa powder, hot filtered Shawnigan Lake water, Cowichan Valley raw honey and the raw goat's milk I hand-milked on Sunday down the road in our local version of a goat share co-op. Boy was I jittery, and man was that yummy.
My project for the morning was to finish painting several of my walls in butter-golden yellow. I don't mean annatto-dyed or insipid white contemporary grocery store butter. I'm talking about pumpkin-bright butter from pasture-fed cows like that I've had from Ontario farmer Michael Schmidt's land.
Between sips of hot chocolate, I'd wipe my paint-covered hands to check online if the Schmidt verdict was in yet: I knew this would be the day he'd be acquitted or reconvicted in an Ontario courthouse on charges which suggested his long-standing practice of selling shares in his dairy herd of heirloom Canadienne cows at Glencolton Farms to persons who wanted to partake in their fresh, clean, organic lactation products was illegal.
Nothing. I surfed recklessly, finding recipes for homemade milk-paint as I waited, returning to butter my living room with a commercial low-toxin brew. Rolling paint to wall, I recalled my various escapades in search of fresh milk. Scene I The parking lot at a farmers' market, me looking surreptitiously both ways before opening a designated van's trunk to pick up my goods.
Scene II Banister-free uneven stairways down to the basement of a used clothing store to find a fridge where I'd find illicit litres of white liquid and a triangle of contraband local cheese.
Scene III My Vancouver apartment, some years back, waiting for six fellow shareholders in a pair of local cows to drop by to pick up their milk, which now filled the shelves of my fridge. Palpitations because I'd have to reprimand one or two friends for not cleaning their jars properly. No, this just wouldn't do: Neither I nor the farmer would re-wash on their behalf. We were operating a clean micro-dairy. We had to do this together.
Finally, the news reports started to dribble in, rich like the last bits of cream at the end of milking. I wept as I read Justice of the Peace Paul Kowarsky's dismissal of 19 charges laid in 2006 against Schmidt, whom I see as restoring culture into agriculture through rigorous and community-based organic farming practice.
These were tears of relief. They were also tears of respect for Schmidt, who ably defended his own case in court. They were tears whose bitter intensity surprised me, reminding me how deeply I feel about consuming and producing good-quality, nutrient-dense, compassionately raised, socially engaged local clean food here and now.
Canadian laws prohibit the sale and distribution of unpasteurized milk, though consuming raw dairy is in itself quite legal. Constitutionally speaking, the effect of this legislation is to limit raw milk access to those who own their own dairying animals -- a clear inequity. As have many farmers in mandatory pasteurization jurisdictions across North America, Schmidt undertook to rectify this barrier to access by selling shares in his dairy herd.
As an ex-vegan, I know that milk is not everyone's drink of choice. As a clinical nutritionist, I counsel that dairy is not always an appropriate food. But for me, Schmidt's acquittal is not so much about milk, cheese, butter, yogurt or ice cream. It's about standing up for ourselves, our land, our bodies, our communities, our wisest traditions and our collective autonomy.
That the Canadian legal system has affirmed that those of us who wish to hand-pick our farmers may indeed continue to do so is a great success indeed.
Well, back to painting then. As it turns out, my next walls are to be chocolate brown. Go figure.
Nadine Ijaz practises and teaches nutrition and herbal medicine on Vancouver Island, where she lives with her son and two sheep.
Read more: http://www.nationalpost.com/life/health/story.html?id=2480911#ixzz0jWL4Vejg
==========================
preparing for the hearing in Court, I solicited testimonials from sharemembers to do with raw milk improving their health.
ONE LITTLE STORY
My name is Vanja Brankovic. On behalf of my little, but precious family I would like to share a few words with you. First, I would like to say that I am very limited in my writing skills. English is my second language, but I hope I will be able to express my thoughts and feelings, they really come from my heart.
I came to Canada 1996 from former Yugoslavia, where enjoying dairy in any form was matter of the choice. At the open Public Markets one could by dairy products directly from the farmer who was manufacturing them. As well, milk and other products could be purchased at any grocery store, pasteurised or unpasteurised. My family knew few favorite, trusting farmers.
I enjoyed raw milk all my life, my parents would go directly to the village near Sarajevo, where we had a weekend house, and every Sunday I would drink milk, still warm, from my favorite cow called Belka, meaning White. She was friendly, happy, white cow with beautiful long eyelashes who was enjoying her meadow every day, choosing her own food and juicy grasses, and before the sunset she and few of her roommates would go back to their little stall to be milked.
Living there, I never experienced having milk or dairy allergy or sensitivity, until I came to Canada and started buying pasteurised milk, as the only known choice Than, it happened to me, I started getting diarrhea, I was bloated constantly, for long time not knowing where is that coming from. After few years I was told that I am having dairy sensitivity. What a shock! Me,how come?
It took me some time, after a lot of reading to come to understanding what happens to that precious substance that gives life to all mammals, how it is treated, how it is enriched after being changed from its original God given form, how the poor animals are treated, kept in closed and tight environment, being sick and unhappy, treated with antibiotics, feed with whatever given, no choice on their own, just for the purpose of making more profit for the owner or corporation. Of course, That milk has to be pasteurised, thank God... What would happen to people drinking that kind of substance from the udder full of puss?
Then, my husband and me got our precious child Ana. After she turned one year of age she stopped breastfeeding. We started buying organic milk from Capers for her. It did not work. We tried with goat's milk. It did not work either. She constantly had diarrhea, green, mucousy stool accompanied with very bloated tummy. Finally, we gave up feeding her milk. Only milk she knew was rice or almond milk. How unfortunate, I remembered my happy childhood and time when I could enjoy a glass of still warm, raw milk with bread, butter and homemade plum jam. How would I love my child could have that opportunity.
After she turned two years of age, a good friend who became a shareholder at Home On The Range told me her story of happy milk-hood for her baby. I almost jumped from joy and soon after become a shareholder myself.
After few years of not having dairy at all, I had a first glass of that heavenly tasting drink with my husband. We waited for few days to see if I am going to have any trouble digesting it. Nothing happened. Then, we carefully gave first bottle to our precious child and waited for few days to see reaction. It did not happen! Wow, how come? Now, Ana is almost three and every day has raw yogurt that we make ourself, not having any digestion trouble again.
Now, I have to ask all of you, people of good will and intention. I understand your concern for public health, but please, please let us have a choice. I was so happy coming to this beautiful, democratic country where I was told people have freedom to have what they feel and believe is best for them and their families. It is not hurting anybody to let us drink raw milk, it is just our only choice. If we don't have that opportunity, that means that my daughter and I can not drink milk at all, because either of us is not able to digest pasteurised one.
I wish all of you would give it try yourself and experience what many of us shareholders did. Than, maybe, you would understand why we want to keep this alive so much.
Please, please, please I have a great hope, that me and my family will be able to say: "Thank you!"
Branislav, Ana and Vanja
