in favor of high-yielding black-and-white
Friesian (Holstein) cows, which now account
for 90% of all American dairy cattle and 85%
of British. The cows are farmed in ever larger
herds and fed an optimized diet that seldom
includes fresh pasturage, so most modern
milk lacks the color, flavor, and seasonal
variation of preindustrial milk.
Dairy Products Today Today dairying is split
into several big businesses with nothing of the
dairymaid left about them. Butter and cheese,
once prized, delicate concentrates of milk’s
goodness, have become inexpensive, mass-
produced, uninspiring commodities piling up
in government warehouses. Manufacturers
now remove much of what makes milk,
cheese, ice cream, and butter distinctive and
pleasurable: they remove milk fat, which
suddenly became undesirable when medical
scientists found that saturated milk fat tends
to raise blood cholesterol levels and can