Got Milk?

Got Milk?Yesterday afternoon, I pulled out an ice-cold, honest-to-goodness glass bottle of milk from my refrigerator.It was something I hadn’t done since I was ten years old. And, I am not exaggerating when I say it was the best glass of milk I have ever had.Sometime between heading off to college and winding up here in Lawrence, I stopped that wholesome tradition of drinking milk with every meal. In fact, if I didn’t take cream with my coffee, I wouldn’t buy it all. So, on Day 3 of my 100-mile diet, I was shocked by just how good this glass of milk tasted. I am not sure if it was the freshness, my delirium from lack of caffeine or the wave of nostalgia induced by the glass container, but I found myself pouring glass after glass of this creamy, white goodness.My grandmother used to have similar, ice-cold bottles of milk in her refrigerator. She purchased it from my uncle, who was a dairy farmer down the road. But over the years – whether it was the concern generated by unpasteurized milk, an attempt to cut down on fat with skim milk or that she was just too busy to bother with that extra stop to the dairy farm on the way home – those glass bottles were replaced with plastic ones from the store.So it was a serendipity when I walked past the dairy case at The Community Mercantile and discovered that, yes, they did sell milk that comes within a 100 miles of Lawrence. And, even better it comes in fancy glass containers. The milk is from Iwig Family Dairy in Tecumseh. And, according to the back of the bottle, the third generation family farm produces and processes all the milk, which is free of hormones and antibiotics. Granted the milk isn’t cheap. For 1.89 liters, I forked over $3.49 plus $2.75 for a bottle deposit (which I get back if I return the bottle). All told it’s more than six bucks for a bottle of milk. But, I as gulped down glass number three, I decided it was totally worth it.