Got Milk?

As summer comes, many of us dream of dairy.  Ice cream, milkshakes, and corn on the cob with butter are just a few of the treats of the season that depend on that staple, milk.  Usually, we don’t give it much thought, but there’s actually a lot to explore in the history and uses of milk and dairy products.

Milk: A Global and Local History by Deborah Valenze delves deeply into the history and cultural meanings of milk.  Before medieval times, it was considered dangerous for all but the very young and the very old; “only the sturdy (and in the case of hard cheeses, the vulgar) could tolerate the digestive challenges of milk”.  But, milk had a renaissance along with art and music.  As Europe’s cities swelled, milk became more and more popular as “the cheapest of all belly-provisions”.  And as people were able to journey further and further from home, the role of cheese expanded as well: “though milk was the most fragile of consumable goods, cheese was a constant traveler”.  Soon, a reverence for science led to the chemical modification of milk for various reasons, and once that had taken place, the big business of milk was not far behind.

I love a good dive into history, but I’m actually glad that I read Valenze’s book in the spring.  It’s dense and something to savor, but a little too heavy for summer.  The perfect summer read about milk is Anne Mendelson’s Milk: The Surprising Story of Milk Through the Ages with 120 Adventurous Recipes That Explore the Riches of Our First Food.  Mendelson’s tone is lighter, and since she isn’t intending to provide a consistent history, she can jump around—hence, a whole chapter on raw milk, and a discussion of the basic question, how should milk really taste?

Mendelson’s book really takes off when it gets to the recipes (which have lots of background and detail, naturally).  That clotted cream that seems so quintessentially British on a scone with jam?  Serbia, Turkey and India have it too, and it is excellent made with water buffalo milk (!).  Mendelson shows us how to make everything from rice pudding to chhenna (a cheese-like food from India), with incredible variations (19 on yogurt alone).  How about some chłodnik? Sometimes made with beets, the recipe here is for a cold savory buttermilk soup, which one admirer called “a poem of a Russian iced soup” (although this variation is Polish).  The soup—and the book—are perfect for a summer’s evening.  Enjoy!