This being Ice Cream Month and all, we wanted to focus on the ingredients and producers that let us make this sweet creamy treat. So today we have another sort of treat for you: a tour of a dairy farm!
This tour comes to you from Sarah, who usually writes for AT:Chicago. This summer she visited a dairy farm and took tons of great photos. Make sure to watch the slideshow. (Cute kids, cute calves, and baby bottles!)
From Sarah:
This summer I was privileged enough to join a group of Kindergarden-Fifth Graders on their adventure to a local dairy farm. Shatto Milk is a pride and joy of Kansas City. They are a small, family owned and operated farm, located just north of the metropolitan area. The farm has been in their family for over 100 years; the last 60 of those it has operated as a dairy farm and for the last 5 have been processing their milk in house, to insure the best product you can buy reaches stores.
This journey was a grand adventure that not only taught children where food truly comes from, but also was a great lesson for the adults in accompaniment about supporting local growers/farmers in order to bring a healthier product back into our community.
The milk sold by Shatto Milk Company can go from cow to the store in as little as 12 hours. They sell everything from your standard 1%, 2% and whole milks, to the ever tasty Rootbeer Milk, Banana Milk, Chocolate Milk, Strawberry Milk and Orange Milk.
Cream, butter and half and half can also be picked up and are well worth the glass bottle deposit to bring such tasty treats home (if they make it that far!). Although, we often have a hard time returning the bottles since the typography on their bottles is so fantastic. They sport such words as, Family, Local, Fresh, Yummy and Cheers. There just isn't a comparison to milk that is transported by bottle. It stays colder, fresher, is more earth friendly and just plain old tastes better.
The small handful of dedicated workers at the Shatto Farm have made it their top priority to limit the number of times the milk is handled and to process the milk in a manner that maintains its superior taste. Shatto milk comes from cows that haven't been treated with rbST (recombinant bovine somatotropin) or recombinant bovine growth hormone (rbGH). Furthermore, it only comes from cows that are born and raised on their family owned farm, which are considered part of the Shatto family.
Since they believe wholeheartedly in providing the best product they can, they are also farmers and provide most of the forage (silage or food) for the cows from their own property. The cows are milked daily and receive personal attention to make sure that their health is maintained. Personal records are kept on each cow and calf to assure growth and development proceeds as normal. A local veterinarian is used whenever preventative health measures are required.
They are able to grazes in acres upon acres of pasture when it isn't milking time and have covered shelter to rest or sleep.
• Shatto Farm
9406 N. HWY. 33
Osborn, MO 64474
816-930-3862
Thank you Sarah!
Related: Survey: Have You Ever Toured a Farm?
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That's really lovely! It also makes me happy whenever I see a dairy farm that actually feeds their cows grass - their natural wild-type diet - rather then grain. Sadly, the majority of cows in this country are fed grain. The milk from grass-fed cows is better for you (it contains conjugated linoleic acid, among other things) and it's better for the cow. Hurrah for Shatto!
you are right about shatto being the pride and joy of kansas city. i love their milk so much that i go to a different grocery store just to buy it!
I thought July was National Ice Cream Month? Is August "Ice Cream Month" and July "National Ice Cream Month"? Just checking in, because it would be a shame if Scoopalicious didn't know about ANOTHER ice cream month -- the more the merrier!
Shatto really is delicious... Its the only chocolate milk I've ever liked...
These cows look so happy and healthy. I can see how cows from a farm like this produce healthier milk than "corporate cows".
Staceyann Dolenti
I wish there was some more editing done on these some of these posts; the blurb of information could have been written more concisely. Acres upon acres of pasture? Romantic much? And why mention rBST and rBGH separately? They are the same molecule.
1. Corn is a tropical grass.
2. ALL ruminant milk contains both biologically active isomers of CLA: it is biohydrogentated in the rumen.
3. Group housing calves can cause increased incidence of scours and respiratory disease, and most definitely does not work on most dairies.
4. What exactly is a "corporate cow"? 98% of dairy farms in the US are family owned: if a family forms a corporation or an LLC for a business structure, that's bad? I can tell you from years of experience that cows from large dairies produce equally healthy milk as those from small dairies. What makes you think otherwise?
I am a ruminant nutritionist. It's great to see a dairy farm on apt therapy. But please be aware that feeding cows silage and keeping records is what 99.9% of all dairy farms in the US do, you would be out of business quite swiftly if you didn't. Corn silage contains grain, FYI - it's the entire plant chopped to 3/4" and fermented. There is also nothing wrong with feeding cattle grain.
I hope more people will tour commercial dairy farms to understand the industry and get correct information directly from the source: US dairy producers.