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This is unpasteurized milk.
This phrase is usually used in reference to cheese-making. Cheese connoisseurs swear that pasteurizing milk affects the taste of the cheese. They say that while the flavour of pasteurized milk cheeses is pretty much fixed for their life span, the flavours of cheeses made from raw milk really evolve and develop as the cheese ages.
As for sale to consumers for drinking, Raw Milk can be sold only in local, country areas, often from the farm gate, in England and Wales (it is banned in Scotland).
The UK government has considered banning it many times, but the stopping point at the present (2004) seems to be the prospect that they could put English and Welsh producers out of business, while under EU law the government couldn't stop people from bringing it back from France, where it is freely sold. In 2004, new regulations in the UK discouraged retailers from putting unpasteurized cheeses next to pasteurized cheeses. Rather than have to sort out separate display cases, some retailers simply stopped carrying the unpasteurized cheeses. In the UK, one of the most reliable places to get unpasteurized cheeses is at stalls run by the makers themselves at farmer's markets.
The French don't currently seem amenable to changing their Milk laws to make life easier for the English authorities. The French use Raw Milk a great deal in making their cheeses, many of which are banned in North America because of that Raw Milk. The USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) requires that cheeses made with raw milk must be allowed to age at least 60 days before they can be imported into America.
In the UK, Raw Milk is designated by a Green Top on the bottle. See Milk for details on what other bottle cap colours mean.
Also called:  Lait Cru Lait Cru (French) Rohmilch (German)
See Also
Cheese
Other entries for Milk
Buttermilk, Clabbered Milk, Cream, Crème de Brebis, Evaporated Milk, Goat's Milk, Gold Top Milk, Kefir, Koumiss, Powdered Milk, Raw Milk, Whey, Yoghurt
Other entries for Dairy
Butterfat, Butter, Cheese, Nondairy Topping
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