Here's the untold story of raw milk. Raw or pasteurized? It should be your choice.

written by

Marie Reedell

posted on

May 27, 2025

*Originally published 5/20/22. Updated 5/27/25.

Raw milk has been a highly contested issue in modern history.

Is it a healthy nutrient-dense “cure-all” for nourishing your body, or is it a dangerous vector for spreading life-threatening disease? The two camps are split. It is a complicated issue with mixed battles of bad science vs. personal testimony, morals vs. politics, education vs. advertising, and big agri-business vs. small farms.

Let's dive in...

A Brief History of Raw Milk

Nutrient-dense fresh raw milk has been a staple food for many cultures worldwide for a loooong time.

I mean, humans started drinking it thousands of years ago. It just made sense. It was a part of agriculture, but it looked a lot different then than it does today. In the beginning, a family or community would share a dairy cow. The cow would live outside and eat the pasture that was naturally present.

Over time, farmers specializing in dairy became a thing. They would keep the cows, do the milking, and provide milk for the greater community. They would hand milk, cool it in fresh spring water, and transport it with horse-drawn carts.

Raw milk was nourishing, providing moisture, protein, and nutrients. It would help people have food through cold winters. And the milk could be preserved into cheese for long trips and to build up food storage.

This has never been a problem until recent history.

During the Industrial Revolution in the early 1800s, whisky and milk were the two most popular beverages. A cutthroat entrepreneur came up with the revolutionary idea to confine cows in a factory-like setting, make them stand still, and force feed them the hot grain byproduct from making whiskey, which is called "swill". Definitely not natural for a cow!

This fresh raw milk was accessible to people in cities. Remember, cars weren't the norm then, so getting milk from farms outside the cities and keeping it cool was a major operation. This milk was also cheap to produce. I mean, the feed was a by-product that was basically free. Milk "farmed" like this was popular, but...

Produced in these unclean and unnatural conditions, this blue-tinted “swill milk” made many people sick and led to many deaths. This was a true public health issue, resulting in many infant deaths and a rise in life threatening illness.

This historical pinpoint is the origin of raw milk getting its bad reputation.

Policy makers and businesses had two options: (1) Higher quality farming practices in city or rural dairies; or (2) Pushing infected products from unhealthy animals.

Can you guess which choice big business made?

The swill milk industry chose to mask the symptoms of swill milk by using additives like plaster, chalk, sugar, eggs, starch, flour, and pigments. These “bad” distillery dairies gave “good” small clean dairies a bad name.

Eventually this truly horrid milk was busted for harboring deadly diseases. Pasteurization was presented as a cheap solution.

Louis Pasteur (1822-1895) was a scientist who promoted pasteurization as a way to make milk safe for consumption. Philanthropist Nathan Strauss (1848-1931), co-owner of Macy’s, jumped on the pasteurization bandwagon and created milk factories that sterilized diseased milk. He, along with other big dairy owners, used his wealth to influence government agencies and advertise pasteurized milk to the public, including scary fake news articles in popular magazines.

Of course, there’s always the flip side: Better standards for clean raw milk production.

The Certified Milk Movement was led by Dr. Henry Coit (1854-1917). Dr. Coit believed in milk as a necessary healthy food. He influenced and created the Medical Milk Commission and its standards to ensure production of clean, healthy raw milk from small farms.

However, this milk cost 4x more than the unclean kind. Given the advertising efforts of the pasteurized milk businesses, can you guess which milk the public latched onto? Yup, pasteurized milk.

And the story goes on in a similar manner throughout the 1900s, with the two sides being divided and working against each other.

Big agri-business advertises and lobbies for pasteurized milk (Got Milk?), which can be produced more cheaply. Small farms and families fight for their right to choose what foods are healthy to consume.

Raw Milk Laws Today

The biggest game changer for raw milk access happened in 1987. Ronald Reagan promoted the ban on interstate commerce of raw milk to the FDA, and it became law.

Goodbye, free market. This devastated (and continues to devastate) small farmers and the families that choose to consume raw milk.

The 35-year-old ban means that, even though a farm like ours can be legally certified by the State of Pennsylvania for raw milk production for humans, we can sell that milk in Pennsylvania only.

Raw milk for human consumption cannot be sold across state lines. Raw milk laws change state by state. You can view a real milk legal map here.

For example, New Jersey’s laws do not allow raw dairy for humans at all. We cannot legally deliver raw milk for human consumption to NJ. However, a person from NJ can drive to PA, buy or pick up milk, and then drive back to their home and consume it. That’s perfectly legal.

Additionally, no US government recognizes fresh raw dairy products (cream, butter, yogurt, kefir, etc) as fit for human consumption in any capacity.

No US farm is permitted to sell these foods for human consumption (with some “gray area” exception for herd shares in some states).

And I mean, it’s kind of ridiculous. If a state allows raw milk for humans. Why not cream? It’s the same thing!

With the proper certifications and paperwork, raw dairy for pets is legal, even across state lines.

Miller’s Bio Farm believes in raw. That’s why we offer a huge selection of raw A2/A2 dairy for cats & dogs. Even if we can only sell it and support the health of your furry family members, we’ll do it. We believe that it’s a step, albeit small, in the right direction.

And gee, if we could get all of our raw dairy certified for humans, we sure would!

It's important to note that raw cheese aged at least 60 days and under the right conditions is also legal across state lines.

This law is based on scientific evidence showing that aging cheese for 60 days under proper conditions produces chemical activity in the cheese that kills harmful bacteria.

Side Note: The cottage laws in Pennsylvania allow someone to get certified to prepare food in their home kitchen (beef jerky, cookies, jams, salsa, etc) and legally sell it across state lines. It makes me think: Is certified raw milk potentially more dangerous than this?

The Future of Raw Milk

Miller’s Bio Farm will continue to advocate for high quality, low risk raw dairy for humans. Here are 4 reasons why.

1. There are many proven health benefits.

2. The food landscape has changed. With the rise of eCommerce and delivery services, our food world is expanding. State by state laws don’t make as much sense anymore.

3. Modern technology allows us to produce an ultra low risk raw product. We have meticulous safety standards and test every batch of milk on site. You can learn more about our milk safety standards and view our test results here. We’re meeting the requirements for pasteurized dairy plus some. We follow these standards for both human and pet dairy products.

4. People who want raw dairy will get it no matter what. If raw milk is not legalized, then the government is ultimately supporting black market milk (just like marijuana, folks). Now, that’s really not good and could be potentially dangerous.

Even if we cannot provide raw dairy products for everyone everywhere now, we have hope for a better food future. A future filled with honesty, transparency, safety, and choice.

Yes, the two camps are split. But, perhaps both are in the right, depending on the situation.

It is undoubtedly true that unpasteurized milk produced in unclean conditions can be very dangerous. However, it is also true that clean raw milk can be a completely safe and nutritious food choice, especially with modern refrigeration, transportation, and testing technology.

I would hope there is a way for both points of view to co-exist, to agree to disagree, and create policies that allow for basic human choice to consume what they view as healthy.

Let’s put a little more perspective on it, too. Is food and raw dairy really that dangerous?

The CDC estimates that there are about 3,000 deaths from food-borne illnesses every year. About 46% percent come from produce (mostly leafy greens), 22% from meat or poultry, and 14% from dairy.

From 1993-2006, there have been 3 deaths attributed to raw dairy. That's 0.23 deaths per year, which means raw dairy accounts for 0.008% of all deaths attributed to food-borne illnesses.

There are 35,000+ deaths from automobile accidents every year. You tell me. What should be our biggest concern?

What do you think? Would you change the raw milk laws? How? Has modern eCommerce, food delivery services, and safety technologies changed the food world, and should the laws change too? Why is raw milk still so vilified?

I’d love to hear from you. Comment below (no account required) or contact us .

If you are interested in learning more about raw milk history and laws, I recommend the very informative videos created by Nourishing Liberty or perusing the realmilk.com website.

PS: Miller’s Bio Farm believes in raw. But, more than that, we believe in choice. That’s why we offer raw dairy as well as lightly pasteurized and minimally processed A2/A2 dairy. We make the best of both, and the choice is yours!

Raw Dairy

Opinion

Health and Nutrition

Farming Practices

Top 3 reasons why grass fed raw milk changes in flavor and consistency.

Have you ever noticed that the flavor and consistency of our raw milk varies from week to week and especially season to season? This is 100% normal! You see, when you raise animals naturally on pasture (and especially when they're 100% grass fed like our cows and buffalos), the milk changes. This is starkly different from pasteurized milk you'd find in stores, which is usually from grain fed cows in feedlots. With that level of unnatural control, the milk can be consistent (or maybe I should call it boring). Here are the top 3 reasons grass fed raw milk varies: 1- Butterfat changes with the seasons. It's highest in the colder months. From the anecdotal experience of myself and our farmers, butterfat is highest in the spring. That's when milk is the creamiest, the most yellow, and the most flavorful (after all, fat holds the color and the flavor). That's when you get a hefty creamline in your jug of milk after sitting in the fridge for a few days. But then... I found an interesting study on this. It's from 1931, before dairy farming got seriously messed up. It tracked hundreds of cows over many years. The researchers found that butterfat and outdoor temperature have an inverse relationship. And they found that it didn't really matter when the cows give birth and the age of the cow. Fascinating! In short, the higher the temp outside, the less butterfat. The lower the temp outside, the more butterfat. Check it out: Another interesting note on the graph is they found that Jersey cows produce milk with the highest butterfat. We noticed this, too, and it's why Aaron's herds are 80% Jersey and 20% Jersey crosses. That's why our milk is so darn creamy! It does make me wonder why, anecdotally, we feel butterfat is highest in spring. Maybe it's because our cows produce the most milk in the spring and least in the winter...? We feel like we're swimming in butterfat in the spring. We make sooo much butter at that time of year. 2- Flavor changes with the feed. When the forage, the weather, and the seasons change, so does the flavor. When cows are outside on pasture, eating a diversity of plants, the flavor of the milk they produce is more robust. Mostly this is a good thing. In my opinion, our pastured milk is more flavorful and tastes better than conventional grain-fed feedlot milk. But, sometimes this can kick us in the butt. For example, when a cow finds a little patch of onion grass, that can create an odd flavor in the milk. The weather affects what the cows are grazing on, too. For example, when we're in a drought, the grass doesn't grow as voraciously. It's has less moisture and protein and isn't as fully developed. That can change the flavor of the milk. And finally, there are, of course, the seasons. When the cows are eating fresh pasture in the warmer months, the milk will have a different flavor than when they're eating dry pasture (AKA hay) in the colder months. It's hard to predict what the final flavor will be. But, I sure do love tasting the differences in milk throughout the year! 3- How long it lasts changes with cleanliness. Clean milk lasts longer! Milk safety is a top priority here at Miller's. Our strict milk safety standards go beyond what's required for a raw milk permit in Pennsylvania. We test every batch on site for general bacteria counts. Not many raw milk farmers do that, but we sure hope more hop on board! Since we test every batch, we're able to keep a close eye on how well the team is cleaning. Even a small thing like a cat licking equipment in the barn, a tiny hairline crack somewhere, or water not being hot enough can make a big difference. Because of our constant monitoring, we're pretty confident in saying that our milk is the cleanest around. There's no manure in our milk! And because of this, our milk lasts longer than most. It's raw milk and will sour (no way to prevent that). But, it should last at least 2 weeks after you receive it before it becomes too sour to palate. Do you value milk consistency over naturalness? Have you noticed changes in our raw milk over time? What about milk makes it "the best" for you? I'd love to hear from you. Comment below to share your thoughts with our community (no account requred). Or, contact us to keep it private 😊 PS: Did you know that we make our fresh raw cow dairy in house? That's right. Our team does it in our creamery! Our goat and buffalo farmers make their own fresh raw dairy in house, too. ----- Sources THE INFLUENCE OF ENVIRONMENTAL TEMPERA- TURE ON THE PERCENTAGE OF BUTTER FAT IN COW'S MILK*