Milk and more photos
The man of the farm I'm staying at, HK as mentioned before, is an amateur photographer. He's quite good. He used to paint (also lovely paintings) but now takes pictures with cameras instead of brush. His photos of the wildlife around the farm are much better than any I could take (he has a better lens for sure!!) and he keeps a photo blog. Scroll down to see pictures of the pretty birds that frequent the feeders here. H and HK fill those feeders every other day. They must spend a fortune on sunflower seeds for those birds. The chickens eat anything that gets dropped though.
I'm also slowly adding photos to my farmlife album as they are taken. I'm learning a lot about milk cultures and encouraging good bacteria while discouraging bad bacteria. The more you disinfect, the more you need to. It seems that the only thing to do is to start with good bacteria.
H makes sour milk in much the same way as you make yogurt, but without the pasteurization. It's what she and her children drink and it goes very well over muesli. It's a traditional Norwegian food, though now poopoo'd by some as being outdated or poor people's food. Apparently many people in Norway have prejudices like that. Pultost, the traditional cheese that H makes, is also considered by some to be poor people's cheese or food fit only for pigs. H has done cheese tastings at various events (open farm days, slow food festivals, etc) and Norwegians have happily tasted something until they learned it was pultost and then spat it out simply because they believe that pultost is pigfood. I'm dumbfounded by this as I can't think of a single food, let alone cheese (something that seems to be more precious in my mind but maybe not others?), that people in Canada may perceive as unworthy. Maybe catfood. But that's the same here. Can you think of anything that Canadians might spit out in disgust (not from taste but from knowledge/name) or slander? Spam?
Is it because we have such a variety of food to choose from and so many cultures? Is it just me and my bubble; are there other Vancouverites or Canadians who have such prejudices? I'm really quite curious.
I'm developing a taste for sour milk and am quite sad that I won't be able to get or make it when I get home. You need to use unpasteurized milk and you need a starter culture which is slightly different from yogurt culture. If you're using unpasteurized milk you need to be very confident about its environment. Norway (or H at least) has never had a problem with Salmonella (yes I realize this is an egg thing but anyway). Maybe I will be able to find a small scale farmer at home. Though I'd never be able to pick up the milk frequently enough. Maybe a treat on weekends.
I'm also slowly adding photos to my farmlife album as they are taken. I'm learning a lot about milk cultures and encouraging good bacteria while discouraging bad bacteria. The more you disinfect, the more you need to. It seems that the only thing to do is to start with good bacteria.
H makes sour milk in much the same way as you make yogurt, but without the pasteurization. It's what she and her children drink and it goes very well over muesli. It's a traditional Norwegian food, though now poopoo'd by some as being outdated or poor people's food. Apparently many people in Norway have prejudices like that. Pultost, the traditional cheese that H makes, is also considered by some to be poor people's cheese or food fit only for pigs. H has done cheese tastings at various events (open farm days, slow food festivals, etc) and Norwegians have happily tasted something until they learned it was pultost and then spat it out simply because they believe that pultost is pigfood. I'm dumbfounded by this as I can't think of a single food, let alone cheese (something that seems to be more precious in my mind but maybe not others?), that people in Canada may perceive as unworthy. Maybe catfood. But that's the same here. Can you think of anything that Canadians might spit out in disgust (not from taste but from knowledge/name) or slander? Spam?
Is it because we have such a variety of food to choose from and so many cultures? Is it just me and my bubble; are there other Vancouverites or Canadians who have such prejudices? I'm really quite curious.
I'm developing a taste for sour milk and am quite sad that I won't be able to get or make it when I get home. You need to use unpasteurized milk and you need a starter culture which is slightly different from yogurt culture. If you're using unpasteurized milk you need to be very confident about its environment. Norway (or H at least) has never had a problem with Salmonella (yes I realize this is an egg thing but anyway). Maybe I will be able to find a small scale farmer at home. Though I'd never be able to pick up the milk frequently enough. Maybe a treat on weekends.