It’s illegal to sell raw milk for human consumption in Virginia. But those who get it through herd shares—funding the care and feeding of cows on farms where it’s produced—say it’s worth the trouble, even as nutrition scientists warn “drink at your own risk.” WMRA’s Christine Kueter digs in.
Ten-year-old Gwennie LaVoy has been drinking raw milk since she was three.
GWENNIE LAVOY: I like it better than store-bought milk because I feel that it’s healthier… I like the taste better. I don’t know why, but it just tastes different. When we grow strawberries or tomatoes, we just eat them right off the plant, and we don’t, like, buy them from stores. And we have more of a country life, so I like raw milk better.
Gwennie’s mom, Mabby, who grew up on a cattle farm, has been getting raw milk for her family of six since moving from Fairfax to Albemarle County in 2019.
MABBY LAVOY: I have always gravitated toward minimally processed foods, whether we have made our own bread, or, I mean, I’ve made, yogurt, or just anything we’ve purchased, I’ve always gravitated towards minimally processed foods because there’s a lot of stuff put in our food. That’s really been my thing.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that about 2% of Americans who prepare meals at home consume raw milk each week—about 3.2 million people. While rules about selling raw milk vary by state, in Virginia, it’s illegal to sell unpasteurized milk for human consumption. But there’s a way around the law.
MABBY LAVOY: Okay, this is the cooler that we have all of our empty jars in.
Those who want raw milk buy “herd shares” from farmers, which help pay for care and upkeep of animals, in exchange for regular dairy deliveries or drop-offs. The LaVoys pick up three gallons each week from Windy Hill Farm in Keezletown, where dairy farmers John Welsh and Corinne Warns graze their 12 Jersey cows.
The LaVoys say the price is right, too.
MABBY LAVOY: When I was looking at the cost of organic whole milk, versus joining a herd share, and getting our raw milk, the cost was the same. So you have $7 a gallon for the whole milk, organic, on the shelves, and the same cost for raw milk. And the delivery spot was right around the corner. And I said, “well, that’s a no brainer.”
Nutrition experts aren’t as convinced.
KATHERINE BASBAUM: So it’s kind of like, drink at your own risk.
Katherine Basbaum is a registered dietitian at UVA Health.
BASBAUM: How well do you know the person or the farm getting this raw milk for you from the cows? Are they mindful of udder infections? Are they mindful of fecal matter in the tanks? You know, all the reasons why raw milk can be dangerous . . . nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, all these potential outcomes. From a nutrition standpoint, I’ve looked at the research, and a lot of the claims about raw milk—that it’s less allergenic, that if you have lactose intolerance that it kind of bypasses that, that it has probiotics, you know, all of those things—no. It’s not better in any of those respects.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, between 1998 and 2018 there were 202 outbreaks linked to raw milk that caused thousands of illnesses and 228 hospitalizations from bacteria such as salmonella, e.coli, listeria, and campylobacter. Dairies such as Creambrook Farm in Middlebrook regularly test their animals and milk, but owner Ben Beichler says that process is far from perfect.
BEN BEICHLER: Some of our information we can get back within 24 hours. Population tests, those are very, very quick. Specific tests, like pathogen testing, those can take a frustratingly long amount of time for them to get back on, you know, what the results are. When you’re dealing with a really short shelf life product, like raw milk, where it goes out one week, and it’s consumed, and it’s refreshed the next week, you know, it just makes the process trickier.
Still, Beichler says, Creambrook, which he started with his wife in 2017, is busier than ever. They milk their 150 Jersey cows twice a day and have more than 100 drop-off points around the state.
BEICHLER: There’s a little bit of a cultural shift going on here where people are more interested in their food choices moreso than they were several years ago, and that’s very much been to raw milk’s benefit. It’s fun to serve a very enthusiastic customer base.
Back at the LaVoys’, raw milk’s not just for drinking. They use it to make butter, sourdough bread, yogurt, biscuits, pancakes, even homemade alfredo sauce.
MABBY LAVOY: We own a small share in the cattle. Which is cool! I wish I could milk my own cow here, but I don’t have the fencing, I don’t have the infrastructure, but, man, if I had fencing, we would’ve had a dairy cow already.
Both Windy Hill and Creambrook Farms exclusively raise Jersey cows, which produce milk with a higher fat content than other cow varieties, like Holstein. No matter the breed, though, raw milk tends to have a higher fat content compared to pasteurized whole milk: Creambrook Farms’ raw milk contains about 13 grams of fat per cup, nine of which are saturated—almost half the recommended daily allowance of saturated fat.
Dietitian Basbaum and the federal government’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans urge people to get fewer than 10% of their calories from saturated fat.
A cup of pasteurized whole milk contains about a quarter of the recommended allowance of saturated fat. No matter the fat percentage, though, all milk is a good source of protein, Basbaum says.
