A Pitcher, a Carton, a Bottle of Milk
I bought groceries at Fresh Foods yesterday and, as I was placing the one-gallon jug of 1% milk in the backseat, I had a sudden flashback, from nearly forty years ago. I remembered putting a newly-purchased half-gallon bottle of milk on the floor behind the driver's seat in my little red Mazda. And I recalled that feeling of horrified realization when the glass milk bottle tipped over suddenly as I turned a corner, spilling all of the milk on the floor of my new car.
I remember how hard Bill and I worked to clean up that spilled milk. Our efforts must have been successful, since I don't think we ever had to deal with a sour milk smell, even though we continued to drive that un-airconditioned car for several more years.
As I mulled over the spilled milk incident, I thought back to the years on the farm, when I was just a little girl, when Mom and Dad milked 15 cows by hand, twice a day, every day. Then Mom put the whole milk through the separator on our enclosed back porch, removing the cream from the milk. After that chore was done, Mom had to wash the separator thoroughly so it was ready for the next time. A big, shiny milk truck drove out to the farm every so often to transport our cream to a regional processing plant, while the remaining skim milk was fed to the pigs because, as Dad still says, that's all skim milk is good for.
The December before I turned five, the cows were sold, along with the pigs and chickens and most of Dad's farm implements, and we moved to a house in Norfolk. There, I was surprised to find that a half-gallon, waxed cardboard carton of fresh milk magically appeared, whenever we needed it, in a Meadow Gold box on our back step. Mom explained how she ordered whatever dairy products we needed, so the delivery man could bring them to our house early in the morning, sometimes before the sun was even up. Then, first thing in the morning, Mom stepped outside to lift the lid on the milk box, and bring the milk inside so she could put it in the refrigerator.
When we moved from our house to the Oxnard Hotel, a few months later, we no longer enjoyed the luxury of having fresh milk delivered to our door. Instead, we walked half a block, to one of two neighboring grocery stores, to buy the milk we needed, or Mom would drive across town to Glenn's Market, my grandpa's little neighborhood store, to buy her groceries. Wherever she shopped, Mom usually bought Meadow Gold Milk, or sometimes Roberts, in a half-gallon carton.
I was nine when we moved to the Hotel Mary-Etta in Fairbury, where we lived in a fourth floor apartment. It was many years until we bought our milk in a store again, because the Mary-Etta Cafe had its own "cow." That's what we called the stainless steel milk dispenser that was filled with two huge "bladders" of milk, which were delivered by the milk man on a regular basis. I imagine that each section of the milk machine contained around five gallons of homogenized whole milk. Whenever we ran out of milk in our apartment refrigerator, someone would carry an empty 2-quart pitcher downstairs to the cafe to fill it with milk from the milk dispenser.
These are more modern versions of the milk dispenser we used in the cafe.
After Bill and I were married, Bill drank whole milk by the gallon, or so it seemed, until he realized how much it cost. Then he cut back on the milk habit he had nurtured in college, where he could drink unlimited milk in the cafeteria.
We had lived in Michigan for a couple of years before we discovered the dairy that pasteurized and bottled its own cows' milk. I soon developed the practice of driving out to the dairy store after school to buy our milk in one or two half-gallon bottles, each with a cardboard lid. Bill's Grandma Lucas sent us an old cream skimmer, so Bill could easily lift out the cream that floated on top of the milk in each bottle. He loved to pour that cream on his cereal each morning, or I might whip it, with a little sugar and vanilla, to spoon onto some apple crisp or a piece of pumpkin pie.
Now, we buy our milk at Fresh Foods in half-gallon plastic jugs of 2% milk for Bill, and gallon plastic jugs of 1% milk for the kids. I don't remember when milk processors changed from using cardboard cartons to plastic jugs, or when Bill begrudgingly switched from drinking whole milk to the healthier 2% milk, which contains just a small portion of cream that has been mixed into the milk during the homogenization process.
No matter what kind of container it comes in, though, milk remains a staple in every household--except my daughter, Erin's. She pours non-dairy almond milk on her cereal, just because she likes it.
I remember how hard Bill and I worked to clean up that spilled milk. Our efforts must have been successful, since I don't think we ever had to deal with a sour milk smell, even though we continued to drive that un-airconditioned car for several more years.
As I mulled over the spilled milk incident, I thought back to the years on the farm, when I was just a little girl, when Mom and Dad milked 15 cows by hand, twice a day, every day. Then Mom put the whole milk through the separator on our enclosed back porch, removing the cream from the milk. After that chore was done, Mom had to wash the separator thoroughly so it was ready for the next time. A big, shiny milk truck drove out to the farm every so often to transport our cream to a regional processing plant, while the remaining skim milk was fed to the pigs because, as Dad still says, that's all skim milk is good for.
Before Mom separated the milk, she poured some of the raw, whole milk into a pan on the old combination wood/propane cookstove in our kitchen, and heated it just enough to pasteurize it, killing any bacteria that might be lurking in the milk. That's what we drank and used on our cereal every day: fresh milk served from a metal pitcher.
The December before I turned five, the cows were sold, along with the pigs and chickens and most of Dad's farm implements, and we moved to a house in Norfolk. There, I was surprised to find that a half-gallon, waxed cardboard carton of fresh milk magically appeared, whenever we needed it, in a Meadow Gold box on our back step. Mom explained how she ordered whatever dairy products we needed, so the delivery man could bring them to our house early in the morning, sometimes before the sun was even up. Then, first thing in the morning, Mom stepped outside to lift the lid on the milk box, and bring the milk inside so she could put it in the refrigerator. When we moved from our house to the Oxnard Hotel, a few months later, we no longer enjoyed the luxury of having fresh milk delivered to our door. Instead, we walked half a block, to one of two neighboring grocery stores, to buy the milk we needed, or Mom would drive across town to Glenn's Market, my grandpa's little neighborhood store, to buy her groceries. Wherever she shopped, Mom usually bought Meadow Gold Milk, or sometimes Roberts, in a half-gallon carton.
I was nine when we moved to the Hotel Mary-Etta in Fairbury, where we lived in a fourth floor apartment. It was many years until we bought our milk in a store again, because the Mary-Etta Cafe had its own "cow." That's what we called the stainless steel milk dispenser that was filled with two huge "bladders" of milk, which were delivered by the milk man on a regular basis. I imagine that each section of the milk machine contained around five gallons of homogenized whole milk. Whenever we ran out of milk in our apartment refrigerator, someone would carry an empty 2-quart pitcher downstairs to the cafe to fill it with milk from the milk dispenser.
These are more modern versions of the milk dispenser we used in the cafe.
We had lived in Michigan for a couple of years before we discovered the dairy that pasteurized and bottled its own cows' milk. I soon developed the practice of driving out to the dairy store after school to buy our milk in one or two half-gallon bottles, each with a cardboard lid. Bill's Grandma Lucas sent us an old cream skimmer, so Bill could easily lift out the cream that floated on top of the milk in each bottle. He loved to pour that cream on his cereal each morning, or I might whip it, with a little sugar and vanilla, to spoon onto some apple crisp or a piece of pumpkin pie.
Now, we buy our milk at Fresh Foods in half-gallon plastic jugs of 2% milk for Bill, and gallon plastic jugs of 1% milk for the kids. I don't remember when milk processors changed from using cardboard cartons to plastic jugs, or when Bill begrudgingly switched from drinking whole milk to the healthier 2% milk, which contains just a small portion of cream that has been mixed into the milk during the homogenization process.
No matter what kind of container it comes in, though, milk remains a staple in every household--except my daughter, Erin's. She pours non-dairy almond milk on her cereal, just because she likes it.
Comments
Post a Comment