The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1918-01-18
VALUE OF MILK SHOWN
HELPS TO WIN THIS WAR


Washington, D. c., January IA
OF what value is milk in helping us
win the war?
Let's get at it this way. Suppose
every person in the United States
should eat no beef for one year. That
would greatly increase the amount of
meat we could send to the fighters in
Europe, wouldn't it? On the basis of
1916, it would release, in round
figures, 8,000,000,000 pounds of beef.
That would help whole lot in win
ming the war. We can accomplish
the same increase, in effect, if we
utilize the human food value OF a
milk by-product that we now throw
away or feed TO live stock.
The skim milk, left after butter
making in the United States last
year, could have been converted into
cottage cheese containing 1,O24,497,-
936 pounds of protein. The total pro-
tein in all the beef consumed in the
United States in 1916 was about
953 ZOO, 900 pounds.
In other words, we throw away or
feed to live stock a human food sup
ply that if properly utilized is of
more value than all the beef we eat
in year.
Two things are necessary to cor
rect this waste and direct this poten-
tial human food supply to channels
that will release more meats and
transportable foods for the armies in
Europe. The first is for farms and
creameries to make cottage cheese
out of skim milk and the second is
for the people generally to eat more
cottage cheese.
The greatest opportunities for the
making and using of cottage cheese
are on the farms, because nine-tenths
of the milk is separated on the farm,
and the butter is made there or the
cream sold to the creamery. Since
most of the skim milk doesn't leave
the farm, it will not be made into
cottage cheese unless the operation is
undertaken in the farmhouse. Even
il the proposition went no further than
home production and consumption of
cottage cheese on the farms where
cows are keep the effect upon the
nations food supplies would be ire
mendous. If each person on farms
where there are cows would eat one
half pound of cottage cheese each
week, it would replace more than
500, 100000 pounds of beef in a year
more beef than we exported to the
allies in 1917.
But, in addition to home consump-
ton, the farmer who makes cottage
cheese from skim milk could market
his product in nearby towns or viii
lagos or cities, or perhaps through
creameries. Families in towns and
cities will be able to get cottage
cheese through local markets if they
will make their wants known. And
this they should do-for it is one OF
the things that will help win the war.
Call for Cottage Cheese.
Tell your dealer you want cottage
cheese. If enough people say that, 1t
will insure the transformation into
human food of great deal of skim
milk that is not now so used-and the
final effect, of course, will be to add
to our warwinning food require
ments We can't win the war unless
we bring about great increases in our
food supplies, and we can not cause
these increases unless we utilize every
conservation as well as production
opportunity.
We produced about S9.547, 100000
pounds of milk in the United States
last year and of this 39,600,000,00C
pounds were used for butter making
But in the manufacture Of butter only
per cent of the milk used actually
goes into the butter, and SO per cent
is a -product-skim milk or butter
milk. Accordingly we had 32,679 800,
900 pounds of skim milk last year and
of this only about 1,200,000,000 pounds
were converted to any form of human
food. We have utilized only one
twenty seventh of the possible human
food value of this milk. Part of it has
been an absolute losS-just thrown
away. But most of it has been fed
to live stock This is a utilization OF
some of it's value-but it is not nearly
so valuable usage as it would be il
the skim milk were eaten by humans
as cottage cheese instead of being fec
to meat animals. Fed to pig, 10(
pounds of skim milk, combined most
advantageously with other feeds, will
produce 49, pounds of dressed pork