ON THE DAY I WAS BORN, at home in our big house on 84 Russell Avenue in Buffalo, New York, my mother and I had everything we wanted. That afternoon she rested comfortably on the couch in our sunny front room, in no particular hurry for anything to happen, with her family checking in occasionally. March 29, 1971 fell on a Monday, but my father didn't go to work and my sister and brother stayed home from school. The doctor was just taking off her coat when I arrived on a schedule known only to my mother and me. Then my mother fed me the perfect food from the perfect container. Later, she fed herself some real food: mail order organic beef liver from Walnut Acres, one of the pioneering organic brands.

I was a lucky baby. My mother gave me real food in my first hours and nursed me on demand until I stopped asking for fresh raw milk three years later. If possible, a woman should nurse exclusively for at least one year, or, ideally, until the baby loses interest. Though it's uncommon today among working women, nursing longer than the usual six or twelve months is natural. In modern hunter-gatherer societies, nursing for three years is typical and four to six years is not unheard of. UNICEF and the World Health Organization advise breast-feeding for "two years and beyond."

Breast-feeding cements a profound bond between mother and baby. When things are going well, by all accounts, it's a very nice sensation. Mothers describe loving, trancelike feelings when nursing, and babies will suckle long after they are full. In Fresh Milk: The Secret Life of b.r.e.a.s.t.s, Fiona Giles collected memories of nursing from young children. "It was comforting and relaxing," said an eight-year-old boy. "I looked forward to it." A twelve-year-old girl was more blunt: "The word addictive comes to mind." An older sibling who had been weaned acted out her own farewell as she watched the new baby nurse. She would cover her mother's b.r.e.a.s.t.s and say, "Bye bye, delicious milk."

Breast milk is our first food, the best food, the ultimate traditional food in all cultures without exception. That's why nature made nursing satisfying: to encourage mothers and babies to do it.

Because it was designed as the baby's only source of food, breast milk is a complete meal. If the mother is well nourished on real food, her breast milk will contain just the right amount of protein, fat, carbohydrates, and all the other nutrients for the growing baby, including essential vitamins, with one notable- and interesting- exception. The milk of all mammals lacks iron. Moreover, milk contains the protein lactoferrin, which ties up any random iron that does find its way into the young. There is logic in the missing iron: iron is necessary for the growth of E. coli, the most common source of infant diarrhea in all species. A breast-fed baby rarely needs any additional iron before one year; bottle-fed babies may need iron sooner because infant formula depletes iron. After one year, iron-rich raw liver is often the first solid food for babies in traditional diets.

Breast milk is not only a complete meal but also a rich one: about 50 percent of its calories come from fat. Indeed, fats may be the most important thing about breast milk. At the most basic level, fat is essential for the baby's growth and development, and for a.s.similating protein and the fat-soluble vitamins A and D, but each particular fat in breast milk also plays an important role.

The long-chain polyunsaturated omega-3 fats EPA and DHA in mother's milk are vital to eye and brain development in the baby. Pregnant and nursing women should eat plenty of fish- the only source of fully formed EPA and DHA- and keep eating it. With each pregnancy, a woman's store of omega-3 fats is depleted. The hungry baby neither knows nor cares whether her mother eats wild salmon, but simply takes the omega-3 fats she needs to build her own brain.

As we saw earlier, vegans and vegetarians risk deficiency of EPA and DHA. The breast milk of vegan mothers contains less DHA than nonvegan breast milk.1 Nursing mothers who do not eat fish are wise to take a generous supplement of flaxseed oil. The body can make EPA and DHA from flaxseed oil, but the conversion is uncertain and imperfect. It bears repeating: fish is vastly superior to plant sources of omega-3 fats.

Most of the fat in breast milk is saturated. The body needs saturated fat to a.s.similate the polyunsaturated omega-3 fats and calcium. Mother's milk is a rare source of a saturated fat called lauric acid. Antimicrobial and antiviral, lauric acid is so critical to the baby's immunity that it must, by law, be added to infant formula; the usual source is coconut oil.

The ample cholesterol in human milk is essential to the developing brain and nervous system. So vital is cholesterol, breast milk contains a special enzyme to ensure the baby absorbs it fully.2 Humans make cholesterol in the liver and brain, but infants and children do not make enough cholesterol for health. Thus the American Dietetic a.s.sociation says the diets of children under two must include cholesterol.3 Many other factors in breast milk boost the baby's immunity, an essential shield in its new, germ-filled world. White blood cells, sugars called oligosaccharides, and lactoferrin fight bacteria and viruses. (Lactoferrin from human milk is patented for use in killing E. coli in the meatpacking industry.) Mother's milk contains all five of the major antibodies, especially IgA, which is found throughout the human digestive and respiratory systems and protects tissues from pathogens.4 Babies don't begin to make their own IgA for weeks.

In one of nature's many elegant efficiencies, the antibodies in breast milk are targeted to the pathogens in the mother and baby's immediate environment; they are tailor-made for the baby. Dr. Jack Newman, a breast-feeding consultant to UNICEF, says researchers can't explain "how the mother's immune system knows to make antibodies against only pathogenic and not normal bacteria, but whatever the process may be, it favors the establishment of 'good bacteria' in a baby's gut."

BREAST MILK: A COMPLETE MEAL.

* Complete protein and carbohydrate (for growth).

* Saturated lauric acid (to fight infection).

* Polyunsaturated EPA and DHA (for the brain and eyes).

* Cholesterol (for brain and nerves).

* Many immune factors (to fight infections).

* Beneficial bacteria (for digestion).

Breast milk is the most important food a mother will ever feed her baby. A convincing number of studies confirm that babies who drink this perfect food tend to have better immunity and digestion, lower mortality, and higher IQ than formula-fed infants. They typically have lower rates of hospital admissions, pneumonia, stomach flu, ear and urinary tract infections, and diarrhea than bottle-fed babies. In later life, breast-fed babies often have lower blood pressure and cholesterol, and extra protection against juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, asthma, allergies, respiratory infections, eczema, immune system cancers such as lymphoma, Crohn's disease, diabetes, stroke, and heart disease. Breast-fed babies are less likely to be obese when they grow up, possibly because breast milk is rich in the protein adiponectin. Adiponectin lowers blood sugar and affects how the body burns fat. Low levels of adiponectin are linked to obesity, type 2 diabetes, and heart disease.

Some women find that breast-feeding is not as easy as it looks in those lovely paintings of Madonna and Child. For many understandable reasons, mother and baby may find nursing difficult, painful, or in extreme cases impossible. If nursing isn't right for you and your baby, choose a formula with care. Even with the best intentions, it hasn't been easy for scientists to duplicate the properties of breast milk, which contains more than three hundred known ingredients and probably still more yet to be identified. Most formula contains a mere forty ingredients, and often the main ingredient is sugar. In the United States, most infant formula contains no long-chain polyunsaturated omega-3 fats, an unconscionable omission given their vital role in the eyes and brain. The World Health Organization and the European Union both recommend omega-3 fats for babies; infant formula with DHA is widely available in Europe and Asia.

Soy-based formula and low-fat diets are particularly unwise for babies and children. As we'll see later, soy is far too rich in estrogens. Low-fat diets cause stunted growth, learning disabilities, interrupted s.e.xual development, and the syndrome seen in the babies of malnourished vegan and vegetarian mothers, "failure to thrive," which is marked by slow growth and lethargy.5 The best subst.i.tute for breast milk is made from gra.s.s-fed, raw whole milk, supplemented with live yogurt cultures and gelatin (for digestion), coconut oil (for immunity), and cod-liver oil (for the eye and brain).6 There are also human milk banks for special cases, such as premature babies and those who are allergic to formulas. Throughout history, women, including wet nurses, have provided milk for infants whose own mothers were unwilling or unable to do so. At the Mother's Milk Bank in Austin, Texas, potential donors are carefully screened with blood tests, and donated milk is pasteurized and tested before being fed to babies.

Traditional societies provide advice and a.s.sistance to nursing mothers, usually from older relatives or experienced local women. The contemporary equivalent of this support network is La Leche League, an excellent and friendly source of practical and scientific knowledge about breast-feeding. If you are nursing and run into difficulty, or if you feel lonely or discouraged, try calling these modern-day wise women. They know all about cracked and tender nipples- and your baby will thank you one day.

I Remember Milking Mabel the Cow.

WHEN I WAS TWO YEARS OLD, we moved to the Newcombs' farm in Fairfax County, Virginia, and thus began our relationship with a long line of family cows. There was a red and white Hereford named Katy, a gentle black Angus called Steady Teddy, and then the milk cows: a Guernsey named Emma, who slipped out one evening and was never heard from again, and a Jersey called Tai Tai- an honorific akin to "Mrs." in Mandarin. Later, when we moved to our own farm in Loudoun County, we bought Mabel, a chocolate-colored Jersey. I'm afraid her character didn't conform to the stereotype of the docile cow. My brother, Charles, remembers that "Mabel was often irritated with us."

By then I was nine or ten, and milking was one of my regular ch.o.r.es. On my night to milk, I'd bring Mabel into the barn from the pasture, put her in the stanchion, and give her a little grain while I washed her udder. Then I'd sit on a wooden stool my brother had helped me build and begin to milk, making a ring with my thumb and forefinger and squeezing the teat from the top down, one finger at a time, first one hand, then the other.

There is a pleasant, lulling rhythm to milking. Even now the sounds are vivid: Mabel's noisy chewing and breathing, the soft rustling as the chickens settled in for the night. At first, when the bucket is empty, the milk goes "ping" as it hits the tin. As the pail fills up, each squirt meets the foamy liquid and the pitch drops. In the summer, her tail- called a switch in dairy lore- might miss the flies on her flank and sting my face. With Mabel, there was also a good chance she'd lose her poise and kick the bucket over or step right in it. You had to whisk the bucket away.

Before long her bag was loose and empty, and there were a couple of gallons of milk. If she'd been scratched by brambles, I rubbed her udder with a miraculous salve called Bag Balm, made in Lyndonville, Vermont, since 1899. (I still use it on my own cuts and scratches.) I carried the milk across the footbridge to the house and strained it through a striped pink cloth into gla.s.s gallon jars. We wrote the date, plus AM or PM, on masking tape and stuck it to the jar. That was it.

Going to school smelling of cow was mortifying, and when I had to milk in the morning I always took my shower afterward. I knew we weren't supposed to sell raw milk- after we put an ad in the paper, two friendly women from the state came around to tell us to keep it quiet- but was ignorant about why it was better than supermarket milk. The jars of milk in the fridge were like the wheat berries on the shelves: embarra.s.sing.

Eventually the burden of daily milking grew tedious, and we sold Mabel to a local man, luring her into his truck with sweet corn, and we never kept a cow again. It seems sad now. Having visited dairy farms small and large, tasted industrial and real milk side by side, and learned a bit about how b.u.t.ter and cheese are made, I begin to grasp that having more fresh milk and cream than we could drink was a luxury.

Historically, milk was more than a luxury; it was critically important in the diet. For peasants, the cow kept the grocery bill down and the doctor away. With her ability to convert inedible gra.s.s into milk and cream, the cow was at the center of the domestic economy. Rich in protein, fat, calcium, and B vitamins, milk was known as "white meat," capable of transforming an inadequate diet of bread and potatoes into a pa.s.sable one, especially for children. In cucina povera (peasant cooking), vegetables are often soaked in milk before roasting.

A cow needs nothing more than a patch of gra.s.s, but most European peasants were too poor to own land, and for centuries they grazed animals on common land. In Britain and elsewhere, the gradual loss of access to the commons in the late eighteenth century was catastrophic for peasants, who were no longer able to keep cattle for milk and meat. The British historian J. M. Neeson describes "the stubborn memory of roast beef and milk" and their "swift disappearance" from the diet of the poor after the loss of grazing rights.7 In 1786, the cleric H. J. Birch wrote that b.u.t.ter was too dear for his Danish parishioners. They made do with bread crusts, beer, and cabbage boiled without meat. When "cottagers receive not the smallest patch of land or grazing for cows or sheep, and are not even ent.i.tled to keep as much as a couple of geese on the common . . . then poverty and need reach dire extremes; then cottagers begin to beg- people who have never begged before, and never thought of begging."8 In the New World, too, milk was a staple, from the earliest colonial days right through the middle of the twentieth century, when farmers like my great-aunt Esther still kept a cow in Milford, Illinois. Esther and Uncle Charlie mostly raised crops, but they most likely made a little extra money selling milk and cream. Initially, colonial Americans preferred goats, probably because they were rugged and good at clearing land, and by 1639 there were four thousand goats in the Ma.s.sachusetts Bay Colony. But the cow- a superior milker- gradually replaced goats. Oxen also pulled the plow and provided beef and leather.

Though grazing was allowed on public sites like Boston Common, the European model of using common land for grazing wasn't widespread. The self-sufficient homestead was the original American dream and became the typical farming pattern. In 1626, each family in the Plymouth Colony was allotted one cow and two goats for every six shares of land they held. "This ideal characterized small farming in America for another two centuries," write Annie Proulx and Lew Nichols in The Complete Dairy Foods Cookbook.

JERSEY, QUEEN OF COWS.

I'm charmed by the colorful names of breeds, suggesting their hometown (Kerry) or looks (Dutch Belted) or qualities (Milking Devon). Others known for milk, meat, or both include the Hereford, Simmental, Limousin, Angus, Brown Swiss, Ayrshire, Milking Shorthorn, Norwegian Red, and Holstein-Friesian. The star of the industrial dairy is the Holstein, a Dutch cow known for copious production of low-fat, watery milk. For small dairies, the undisputed champion is the Jersey, a small cow native to the Channel Islands. Docile, an efficient grazer even on poor pasture, intelligent, and productive, she is also the ideal family cow. But the Jersey's crowning glory is her milk: it contains the highest level of protein, minerals, vitamins, and b.u.t.terfat of any breed. Jersey milk is 5 to 6 percent b.u.t.terfat, nearly twice as rich as Holstein milk, with 3 to 3.5 percent fat- the norm for whole milk. Jersey milk (and that of her cousin, the Guernsey) is too rich for some to drink straight. No matter; there will be plenty of fat for cream, b.u.t.ter, and cheese.

Today the family cow is rare, but her role is the same. "The cow is the most productive, efficient creature on earth," writes Joann Grohman in Keeping a Family Cow. "She will give you fresh milk, cream, b.u.t.ter, and cheese, building health, or even making you money. Each year she will give you a calf to sell or raise for beef." The cow also provides manure for the garden, sour milk for the chickens, and skim milk or whey for the pig- milk-fed pork being a delicacy. "I serve exceptionally fine food"- I can confirm this, having eaten at Joann's house-" and I am not stingy with the b.u.t.ter and cream," says Grohman. "The cow is a generous animal."

Keeping a Family Cow inspired Laura Grout, a mother of five, to change her life. "I was living in a trailer park with a postage stamp for land and researching nutrition. After learning that unpasteurized milk is better for your health, I went looking for a legal way to obtain raw milk. This book alone convinced me to leave the city and have a cow." Laura began to raise her own beef, milk, poultry, and eggs in Sand Hollow, Idaho. "Good nutrition is something every mother should strive to give her children," she says, "no matter how rich or poor."9 That was my mother's philosophy in a nutsh.e.l.l. She used to say, "No matter how little money we spend on food, we will always have maple syrup, olive oil, and b.u.t.ter." Now that I live in the city and pay good money for real milk and cream, the significance of a cow is tangible: Mabel made us richer. I loved a bowl of milk and mashed-up peaches; we put milk on hot oatmeal, and dessert was often vanilla pudding or custard. After school, Charles and I made smoothies with raw milk, eggs, coffee, and honey. With Mabel, milk was free and life was good.

A Short History of Milk.

OVER THOUSANDS OF YEARS, humans have herded, corralled, and milked a variety of mammals. In the Near East, our ancestors domesticated sheep and goats about eleven thousand years ago; archaeologists surmise that milk, not meat, was the initial reason for keeping animals. The first shepherds tended sheep and goats, small and easy to handle. They are also rugged: they thrive on poor farmland and don't mind harsh climates. Sheep tolerate cold, wind, and snow, while goats scamper up the steepest mountain and live off brambles or any weed that happens to grow in hedgerows. On the rocky slopes of Greece and the hills of hot, dry Provence, sheep milk cheese (salty, crumbly feta) and goat milk cheese (creamy chevre) have been made since ancient times.

About eighty-five hundred years ago, somewhere in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq), we began to milk the larger and more productive cow. Cows are more delicate than sheep and goats- in bad weather they prefer the barn, and for grazing they favor lush rolling pasture- yet of all the mammals humans have tried, including a.s.ses, buffalo, camels, llamas, mares, reindeer, and yaks, the cow is the champion milker.

That's the conventional chronology of milking, at any rate, but several clues suggest we were drinking milk for much longer than ten thousand years. One clue lies in the popular understanding, or misunderstanding, of early agricultural history. Most people believe that "farming" (meaning both plant and animal husbandry) began about ten thousand years ago in the Fertile Crescent. It is more likely, however, that we herded animals long before we grew corn, wheat, and beans. There is no agricultural reason to link milking with growing grains. The natural diet of ruminants is gra.s.s. Early shepherds didn't need to grow grain: they needed only meadows and some skill in handling animals.

Fences imply that we were shepherds before we were farmers. "Thirty thousand years ago, people in the High Sinai were confining and breeding antelope with the aid of fences, a human invention arguably as important as the spear," writes Grohman in Keeping a Family Cow. Fences were the best means of keeping the best milkers close at hand and choosing the most docile and productive cows to mate. The friendly, efficient dairy cow has been the focus of so much intensive breeding over thousands of years that today she has no wild cousins left, and lives only at our whim.

All meat and dairy cattle are descendants of the original wild ox, a six-thousand-pound giant called an aurochs, described by Julius Caesar as only slightly smaller than an elephant. "The aurochs became extinct in the seventeenth century, the last one dying alone in a private park in Poland," writes Gina Mallet in Last Chance to Eat. "But it can be seen depicted in cave paintings: a large, bony animal with sharp horns impaling stick humans." How the fierce aurochs- a symbol of strength in Viking runes- was eventually domesticated is a mystery. In A Cow's Life, M. R. Montgomery suggests that Neolithic man tamed an aurochs midget first.

In time we were master of bull and cow alike. Fish and game made up most of the typical Paleolithic diet, but this new food, milk, had its advantages and before long it was popular. As a source of daily protein, milking wild ruminants was more reliable than hunting, which was. .h.i.t-or-miss. Hunting also presented a practical problem. Because it was impossible to keep meat fresh without refrigeration, fresh kill had to be eaten quickly. The immediate family of the successful hunter couldn't eat a wooly mammoth in one sitting, so the bounty was shared with the tribe or village. Thus sharing meat with other men- or trading meat (dinner) for s.e.x with a woman- is one of the oldest human activities. Even now, serving a roast is a symbol of hospitality. Milking, by contrast, did not present the feast-or-famine dilemma; it was a steady business.

Technology plays a big role in the history of milk; every advance in fencing, breeding, and preserving milk made milking more efficient. The result is that consumption of dairy foods is nearly universal in human groups. With the notable exception of East and Southeast Asia, all the European and Middle Eastern cultures, and many Asian and African ones, have a shepherding tradition.

Yogurt, the simplest form of preserved milk, is probably as old as milking itself. Milk "invites its own preservation," writes food maven Harold McGee. Fresh milk curdles quickly, especially in hot weather. Yogurt would have been made- or rather, made itself- simply for lack of refrigeration. The precise origins of yogurt are not known but easy to imagine. When fresh milk is left to stand at room temperature, local bacteria begin to consume the sugars. The milk thickens and becomes tangy with lactic acid. Depending on the bacteria, the result is yogurt, sour cream, or some other cultured milk that stays fresh longer than "sweet" or fresh milk.

Another simple method of preserving nutrients in milk is to remove water. In Iran, milk was reduced to its essence, making a sort of milk bouillon cube to be reconst.i.tuted with water. In the thirteenth century, the nomadic Tatar armies of Genghis Khan carried a packed lunch of powdered mare's milk. After skimming off the cream for b.u.t.ter, they dried the skim milk in the sun. Kept in a leather pouch, powdered milk made a convenient meal on the road. It wasn't perishable, and when mixed with water and jostled about on horseback, it made a fermented drink something like yogurt.

Turning milk into cheese is the most sophisticated method of preservation. Gouda, Parmigiano Reggiano, and other traditional aged cheeses mature for two years or longer. Most agree that cheese making is about five thousand years old, but as with yogurt, no one knows exactly where cheese was born, and it's quite possible that shepherds living far apart invented cheese simultaneously. Some of those pioneers were in the French Pyrenees, and in Sumeria, Egypt, five-thousand-year-old pottery bears cheesy residues. Though cheese takes many forms, the basic method--adding rennet to curdle milk- is unchanged, and even particular recipes survive a long time. The recipe for Gaperon, a soft French cheese made with garlic and peppercorns, is twelve hundred years old.

The effects of milk on human diet and culture were widespread and profound. In About Cows, Sara Rath says that six-thousand-year-old Sanskrit writings refer to milk as an essential food. The Hindus, who ate and celebrated b.u.t.ter four thousand years ago, honor cows, as did the Sumerians and Babylonians. The Romans, too, were milk drinkers and cheese lovers, and spread the habit throughout Europe. Cattle- in Latin pecus, from pascendum (put to pasture)- were even used to conduct trades; hence the Roman word for money, pecunia. Caesar was evidently irritated to find that Britons in his far-flung empire neglected to grow crops, preferring to live on meat and milk instead.

The Bible makes dozens of references to milk, which represents privilege, wealth, and spiritual blessings, as in "land flowing with milk and honey." Shakespeare's plays are replete with flattering comparisons to milk, b.u.t.ter, and cream, and modern idioms glorify milk. To flatter someone, you b.u.t.ter him up-, the very best is la creme de la creme.

Whether from the human breast or the bovine udder, milk is the universal perfect food- delicious, soothing, nourishing. Milk is delicate, sensuous, transient. It is both simple- a nutritionally complete meal in a gla.s.s- and marvelously complex, its various ingredients interacting as if the milk itself were a tiny ecosystem. Indeed, traditional milk is alive, teeming with enzymes and microorganisms that evolved right along with man and woman, usually in the belly.

Milk is diverse. The milks of the ewe and the cow, the mare and the nak, are each different. Even within one species, milk is suggestible: the gra.s.s, flowers, and herbs the animal eats create further distinctions, affecting aroma, flavor, and nutrition. The hint of garlic- or more than a hint- in milk is not unknown when animals eat their way through a patch of wild ramps. Gracious and malleable, milk is capable of being transformed into cloudlike whipped cream, silken b.u.t.ter, wobbly yogurt, tangy kefir, creamy fromage frais, fluffy ricotta, and dense cheddar.

No wonder this n.o.ble food has inspired farmers, chefs, poets- and even politicians. William Cobbett was a member of Parliament, pamphleteer, and reformer who toured the English countryside in the early nineteenth century. A self-appointed defender of farm life and the working man, Cobbett understood peasant life better than most politicians. "When you have a cow," he wrote, "you have it all."

I Reply to the Milk Critics.

WE ARE THE ONLY animal to drink milk after weaning and the only animal to drink the milk of another mammal. Whether that's good is a hot topic. Some say milk is a cure-all. In the nineteenth century, doctors credited all-milk diets with all manner of therapeutic effects, and even today modern pract.i.tioners treat maladies from arthritis to eczema with whole raw milk. The other side says milk is poison.

Robert Cohen is one of milk's fiercest critics. The milk carton on the cover of his book, Milk: The Deadly Poison, bears a skull and crossbones, with the ingredients listed in large type: "Powerful growth hormones, cholesterol, fat, allergenic bovine proteins, insecticides, antibiotics, virus, and bacteria." Cohen says dairy foods are linked to acne, allergies, anemia, asthma, constipation, obesity, osteoporosis, and breast cancer. "It is probable," writes Cohen, "that milk consumption is the foundation of heart disease."10 People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals runs a campaign against milk called Milk Sucks! "Dairy products are a health hazard . . . laden with saturated fat and cholesterol. They are contaminated with cow's blood and pus and frequently . . . with pesticides, hormones, and antibiotics."

Press like that could make a vegan out of the most contented milkmaid, and that's exactly what happened to me. I gave up dairy foods to avoid saturated fat and cholesterol and because they were said to be indigestible and allergenic. It was soy milk for me. Later, when I was working with small dairies at the farmers' markets in London, I began to wonder about the bad reputation of milk, cream, b.u.t.ter, and cheese. Our customers were snapping up whole milk and raw milk cheese. As I began to eat real dairy again, it was easy to see why. Soy milk tastes nothing like the real thing. In cooking, b.u.t.ter is irreplaceable. As for cheese, I had barely begun to discover the most complex and diverse form of the remarkably pliable milk.

But I was astounded that people could thrive on the rich dairy foods I thought were indigestible and allergenic. Why weren't b.u.t.ter and cheese lovers plagued with acne, stuffy noses, and stomach cramps? Even more startling, I felt better as I nibbled my way back into real milk, b.u.t.ter, and cheese. Slowly it dawned on me that milk might not be so bad. I began to read more systematically, hoping to uncover the real story of milk- or, more precisely, the whole story. Milk is a complex food, and so are the arguments around it. The critics and the enthusiasts both make good points; the truth about milk seems to fall between the two extreme positions.

What I learned is that all milk is not created equal. Some milk is better than others- for the cow, the environment, and human health. Modern industrial milk is not the same as the milk we used to drink ten thousand years ago- or even one hundred years ago. Not only is traditional milk from cows raised on gra.s.s, without synthetic hormones, more delicious than industrial milk from cows raised indoors on corn and soybeans; it's also better for you. Some forms of milk, such as yogurt, are easily digestible- even for people who think they are lactose intolerant. Nutritionally, raw milk has many advantages over pasteurized milk. Now, when people ask, "Is milk is good for you?" I'm likely to answer, "That depends. Which milk?"

The milk critics make three broad charges. They say that milking is inhumane for cows, dairies pollute the environment, and milk is unhealthy. About the first two, they are absolutely right, with one qualification: industrial dairies are bad for cows and for the environment, but traditional dairy farming is good for both.

According to Jo Robinson, the author of Pasture Perfect, when farmers graze dairy cows outside on their natural diet of gra.s.s, the cows are happy and healthy. Farmers who switch from confinement dairies and a grain-based diet and let their cows roam outside eating gra.s.s watch their vet bills shrink. One reason is that eating grain gives cows the bovine version of acid indigestion, which can lead to stomach ulcers. Large confinement dairies also pollute the environment with stench and manure lagoons. Properly managed grazing, by contrast, enhances soil fertility, water quality, and biodiversity.

The question of health is more complicated. First, the critics contend that humans are not meant to drink the milk of any other species. Second, they say that milk is indigestible for people who don't make enough of the enzyme lactase to digest the sugar lactose. Let's look at each argument.

Is drinking milk unnatural? The critics say that cow milk was "designed" for newborn calves, not for humans. That's true. But this observation does not prove that the human digestive system cannot, or should not, handle milk. After all, the tomato was designed to make more tomato plants, not pasta sauce. In fact, milk and other dairy foods are not only digestible for the vast majority of people- about 85 percent by some estimates- but also highly nutritious. Later, we'll look at important differences between traditional and industrial milk, but for now let's consider its basic components.

Like breast milk, the milk of cows and other mammals is nutritionally complete. All milk is made of the three macronutrients- protein, fat, and carbohydrate- and humans are equipped to digest all three. A good source of complete protein, milk contains all the essential amino acids in the right amounts. Milk contains enough carbohydrates for energy and has a good balance of fats, both saturated and unsaturated.

Because it was made to be the only source of nutrients for growing babies, milk contains everything required to digest and use its nutrients. The fats in milk, for example, enable the body to digest its protein and a.s.similate its calcium. According to Mary Enig in Know Your Fats, the saturated fats in milk (such as butyric acid) are particularly easy to digest because they do not have to be emulsified first by the liver. Unlike polyunsaturated fats, which the body tends to store, the saturated fats in milk are rapidly burned for energy.

Milk is rich in vitamins and minerals. It contains pota.s.sium and vitamins C and B, especially B12, which is found only in animal foods. Milk is the major source of the fat-soluble vitamins A and D in the American diet. As Weston Price observed more than seventy years ago, the calcium and phosphorus in milk are particularly important for handsome facial structure and strong teeth. Dairy foods also reduce oral acidity (which causes decay), stimulate saliva, and inhibit plaques and cavities.

GOOD THINGS IN MILK.

* Complete protein to build and repair tissues and bones.

* Vitamin A for healthy skin, eyes, bones, and teeth.

* Vitamin D to aid calcium and phosphorus absorption and for bones and teeth.

* Thiamine to help turn carbohydrates into energy and aid appet.i.te and growth.

* Riboflavin for healthy skin, eyes, and nerves.

* Niacin for growth and development, healthy nerves, and digestion.

* Vitamin B6 to build body tissues, produce antibodies, and prevent heart disease.

* Vitamin B12 for healthy red blood cells, nerves, and digestion; and to prevent heart disease.

* Pantothenic acid to turn carbohydrates and fat into energy.

* Folk acid to promote the formation of red blood cells and prevent birth defects and heart disease.

* Calcium to make strong bones and teeth; also aids heartbeat, muscle, and nerve function.

* Magnesium for strong bones and teeth.

* Phosphorus for strong bones and teeth.

* Zinc for tissue repair, growth, and fertility.

Critics charge that milk is indigestible for people who don't make enough of the enzyme lactase to digest the lactose in milk. This important argument deserves a full discussion. Lactose plays a large role in the history of milk.

The milk sugar lactose is found in no other food- unless you eat yellow forsythia blossoms in the spring. Without the enzyme lactase, drinking milk causes nausea and diarrhea. Raw milk contains lactase, but the enzyme is damaged by pasteurization. Babies, who drink nothing but milk, produce a lot of lactase; this declines steadily until they reach the age of three or four, and then levels off. The logic of this efficiency is clear. Stone Age mothers nursed babies for three or four years. Unless the child drank milk after weaning, lactase production gradually tapered off. The result is that some adults lack sufficient lactase to digest fresh milk easily. The condition is often known as lactose intolerance, but low lactase production is more precise.

Climate explains the evolution of lactase production. Low lactase production is most common in people whose ancestors came from hot climates, such as East and Southeast Asia and parts of Africa. Where fresh milk could not be kept cold, adults never developed the capacity to produce lactase, simply because they didn't drink fresh milk. In colder climates such as northern Europe, however, where fresh milk could be stored for a week or more, people gradually developed the ability to produce lactase as adults. Genetic a.n.a.lysis shows that milk proteins in seventy European cattle breeds evolved along with human genes for lactose tolerance near northern European dairy settlements in the last eight thousand years, a rare example of cultural and genetic coevolution between humans and another species.11 The genes show that early northern European shepherds were dependent on milk, unlike southern Europeans.

In hot climates, adults with low lactase production didn't forgo dairy foods entirely, however. After all, Italy, Greece, and Israel are but three sunny countries with dairy traditions. Instead they ate cultured or fermented milk products, particularly yogurt, which is easy to digest because it contains little (if any) lactose. Beneficial bacteria have already consumed the lactose and turned it into the lactic acid that imparts the distinctive tangy taste to yogurt. Thanks to these tiny bacteria, almost everyone can digest cultured milk. In cheese making, lactose is also transformed into lactic acid, but more slowly. The longer the cheese has been aged, the less lactose it contains.

This "solution" to the problem of drinking fresh milk was no doubt accidental. Recall that fresh milk left to stand overnight rapidly becomes yogurt with the help of whatever bacteria happen to be about. Quite by chance, shepherds devised many local variations on yogurt- the word is Turkish- including Armenian matzoon, Bulgarian naja, Egyptian laban, and Balkan kefir, traditionally made with fermented mare milk.

TRADITIONAL VERSUS INDUSTRIAL FOOD PROCESSING.

Yogurt and cheese are processed foods. Processed foods have a bad reputation, often justified. But industrial and traditional methods are different: industrial food processing diminishes flavor and nutrition, while traditional food processing enhances both. When whole wheat is refined into white flour, flavor, fiber, and B vitamins disappear. Cold-pressed olive oil keeps its vitamin E and antioxidants. When grape juice turns into wine, antioxidants form. When cabbage becomes kimchi, the result is more vitamin C, enzymes, and good bacteria. Fermented foods like sauerkraut, cheese, and yogurt are among the oldest and most nutritious processed foods. Yogurt is widely a.s.sociated with longevity.

Traditional cultured milks are not only digestible but also nutritious. According to Harold McGee, beneficial bacteria found in "traditional, spontaneously fermented milks" take up residence in our guts and promote health all over the body. The bacteria secrete antibacterial agents, enhance immunity, break down cholesterol, and reduce carcinogens. The bacteria added to industrial yogurt don't necessarily do the same good work. They're specialized to grow in milk only and can't survive inside the body. Moreover, industrial yogurt may contain only two or three selected microbes, while the traditional version may sport a dozen or more friendly bacteria. "This biological narrowing may affect flavor, consistency, and health value," writes McGee.

Cultured foods are vitally important in traditional diets. In many cultures, yogurt is the only form of milk consumed. When versatile milk is transformed into yogurt and cheese, people all over the world can eat dairy foods- and given how practical, delicious, and nutritious milk is, most do.

Milk is also rich in cholesterol and saturated fat. Does that mean the shepherds and dairy farmers who drink whole milk daily have high cholesterol and heart disease?