A Raw Deal

My new discovery at this spring's markets was raw milk. No pasteurization, no homogenization, just udderly thick, yellowy cream straight from the cow to me. Courtesy of the Bahner family farm and the cooler carried from Pittston to the Bath market. (I believe they are in Portland at least on Wednesdays.) I was so astonished by this find, I went right home to whip up a latte in my little machine but that milk was too thick and rich to steam. So I had fabulous cafe au lait--for five days.

When my Tibetan goddaughter, Tashi Chodron who operates the Himalayan Pantry in New York City, decided to make a quick trip to see me, I made a quick trip to the Saturday market to get her that milk. Tibetans go through lifetimes on pure, raw milk, straight up or churned into butter tea or churpi, a cheese harder than the Himalayas. I reckoned she'd be thrilled. So I was seriously disappointed to find Bahner Farm out of raw milk. Perhaps yogurt would do?

That offered another new adventure, one that turned out worthwhile. For starters, it was yogurt that needed a knife, not a spoon. It was more yogurt cheese that spread on bread like whipped butter or perhaps paté. And with a dollop of homemade jam on top...oo la la.
But I digress.

When Tashi arrived, I told her how excited I was to have raw milk and wanted her to make Tibetan tea with it. I bet she couldn't do that in New York. I still had about half the quart but when I opened it, it let out a slightly sour smell. "Damn," I muttered. "It's no good now. I was so looking forward to giving you this." I went to the sink to pour it out, but Tashi raced over to stop me.

"What are you doing? No! Don't lose that precious milk. Give it to me." She took the bottle. "Do you have a large pot?"

"Of course I do."

"Good. We can make yogurt...like my mother did every day in the refugee camp in India. This is perfect."
So she poured the milk into my saucepan and set it to boil and roil. After maybe five minutes, cream started to coagulate at the top. "Wow!" she exclaimed in delight. "This is totally perfect. I'll show you what my mother does." She scooped about four tablespoons of that cream off the top and put them in a dish to cool. The milk boiled away for another five minutes. "Now," she said, "do you have yogurt?"

I opened the fridge, reached past my favorite kind from Trader Joe and handed her the yogurt from the same farm as the milk, telling her that.

"Give me a large bowl. Oh, this is gonna be so good....so good!" Tashi put about a tbsp of yogurt into the bowl and poured in the milk. Then she covered the bowl with a towel and a lid (it was an improvised pot lid since this was not a covered bowl). "Now," she said, "we have to put this in a place where it won't move for 24 hours. You can't shake it or anything."

Once we'd stashed it out of the way at the back of the counter, she put that plated cream into the fridge, clucking to herself with delight. "My mother would be so happy to have this," she said and we went on about the day.

And so the next morning, to my astonishment, like a magician Tashi pulled the lid and the towel off the bowel and voila! it was filled with yogurt! Lots and lots of yogurt. No matter how much we ate, there was still plenty left. Thousands of years from Mongolian nomads to my house in Maine.

That night, Tashi opened the fridge and took out her "cold cream." "This is what we do," she said. "Rub it all over the face and go to bed. In the morning you wash it off and you have smooth, glowing skin." Indeed I could swear she did, because that's what I saw reflected in the sparkle of her eyes.