Kalona Supernatural: As Close To Raw Milk As Possible

The saying goes, “there’s more than one way to skin a cat, and there’s more than one way to milk a cow.” I don’t know about the cat thing, but I can agree with the latter.

In the 1860s a man by the name of Louis Pasteur invented the process of pasteurization, which uses heat to kill bacteria that cause milk to spoil or that can make people sick. The earliest form of pasteurization is called Batch pasteurization. The oldest method requires the milk to be heated to 154.4 degrees Fahrenheit and held at that for 30 minutes. The modern method of pasteurization is a bit harsher. High-temperature short-time (HTST) pasteurization quickly heats milk to 161.6 degrees Fahrenheit. At this temperature milk is separated from its fat. Essentially, the milk is cooked and pulled apart.

According to Carol White, a Howstuffworks.com writer, HTST pasteurization is used “for higher volume processing.” She also says that “this method is faster and more energy efficient than batch pasteurization.”  When I read that all I heard was HTST is cheaper, easier, and able to do more at once.

Unfortunately the FDA has declared that raw milk is illegal. In a press release the FDA stated that, “since raw milk MAY contain human pathogens, the consumption of raw milk products increases the risk of gastrointestinal illness due to the LIKELIHOOD that it may contain infective doses of human pathogens. The only method proven to be reliable in reducing the level of human pathogens….is by those milk products being properly pasteurized.”

What’s next? Will they ban raw meat sales? If beef products follow the same path that milk has, ordering a steak rare will be illegal.

Of course, the risk of milk having human pathogens greatly decreases when the cattle are raised properly.

But today’s rant has nothing to do with raw milk. Today we’re talking about milk that the FDA is only kind of scared of.

Last week I mentioned some products in my Bullet ProofCoffee post. The products come from a company called Kalona Organics Supernatural. Kalona is a dairy company based out of Iowa. They’re still at humble beginnings, so don’t expect to see them on a Walmart shelf any time soon. I had never heard of them until a Natural Grocers had opened in my town.

It was a normal day for me. I had just bought several pounds of steak and I was looking for some cow-juice (milk) to wash it down. I skimmed the milk aisle looking for something more than your average “all natural” product. Then my eyes landed on an orange bottle. The top read Supernatural organic whole milk; cream top. Cream top means that the milk will separate from the fat – just like raw milk.

The milk’s other stats include: non-homogenized, grass-fed, and batch-pasteurized. I think we might have found a winner folks.

Cream-top batch-pasteurized milk is about as risky as the FDA is willing to get when it comes to dairy. Thanks to the “fat scare” the separation of milk from its fat is highly recommended by the FDA. That’s why we have three different types of milk: whole, 2%, and skim. Kalona does a good job of keeping their whole milk nice and fatty.

I had the opportunity to talk with Bill Evans, the CEO of Kalona this week. He’s a great guy running a great company. Not to mention that he’s a Christian man (that’s bonus points on Endu). The conversation lasted a few minutes, and it even escalated to us discussing the possibility of a grassfed organic whey protein. In the middle of our talk Bill said something that makes FDA officials quake, “We’re pro fat.”  Things that make the FDA unhappy normally make me happy.

meet Bill

I like fat, they don’t.

I enjoy some raw foods, they despise them.

I think cigarettes are a horrible invention; the FDA is okay with them.

I guess we'll have to agree, to disagree. Kalona hasn’t compensated me for this post in any way. I don’t think that they should either. I wrote this post because, in my opinion, this is the best milk that you can buy from a grocery store. I’m pretty tired of companies being able to pay people to force feed the population their products. It’s gregarious. It’s unappealing. It’s immoral.

I will never endorse a product that I wouldn’t or don’t use. Ever.

Try their milk if you can. Click here to see if there’s a store near you selling this milk. If you’re unsure, you can click here for a coupon.

Drink up Endu.