Storing Staples: Milkby Mary Ann Romans | More from this Blogger 27 Apr 2007 04:15 AM Storing staples, such as flour, eggs, milk, bread and other common grocery items, is a smart thing to do, whether your goal is to be frugal or to be prepared. Knowing the proper storage methods will help keep your items safe and ready to use. This is especially true for a perishable item, such as milk. Read on to learn about the ways to keep milk for long-term storage. There are all kinds of milk: cow milk, raw milk, goat's milk, soy milk and even breast milk. But for this article, I am going to stick to the basics of storing regular store-bought milk consisting of, or made of, regular cow's milk. You can easily adapt these basic ideas to suit your family's milk consumption. An easy way to store milk is in powdered form. I am a big fan of powdered milk for use in home made breads and other baking items. Powdered, or dry milk, can be easily stored in an airtight container for months. Storing it in the refrigerator extends its usable shelf life three or four times over. To learn more about using powdered milk, click here. Now for liquid milk, I am sure you know enough to store it in the refrigerator; on a shelf instead of a door is best, although I have to confess that in my house it stays on the door. It never seems to last long enough for door-storage to be a problem. For long-term storage, you'll want to freeze your milk. My friend, Laura, does this all of the time with pure raw milk that she purchases in bulk from an Amish farmer (see my Frugal Lessons from the Amish series for more info about the Amish). Skim or low fat milk freezes much better than does whole milk, in terms of separation, but don't let the separation deter you. You can either shake the milk vigorously or beat it with an electric beater to restore its normal blended state. The safest way is to thaw your frozen milk in the refrigerator. Milk can be frozen for up to three months. You can use the original container or pour the milk in a glass container before freezing. Freezing cream is not recommended, because the freeing process causes changes to the cream. While the taste or nutrients won't be altered, the texture will. Related Articles: How Much Did You Pay for Milk Last Year? Frugal Storage: Finding Creative (and Cheap) Ways to Store Your Stuff Learn more about Mary Ann Romans  Mary Ann Romans is a freelance writer, wife and mother of three children. She lives in Pennsylvania with her husband, the kids and a 16-pound cat. Relevantfrugal tags User Comments jonesx6 (1606) 27 Apr 2007 12:56 PMAfter freezing milk for over a year I have come up w/ a trick that helps our raw milk thaw out so it isn't ''clumpy." I leave the milk out on the counter until it is about warm temperatures. I also shake it every few hours so that the fat, aka clumps, melt into the milk. I have to watch the milk in the warmer months b/c it thaws out in about a day. In the colder months a whole gallon takes about 3 full days. Laura  Mary Ann Romans (26886) 27 Apr 2007 01:17 PMAre you are able to actually leave the milk out for three days without it spoiling? Wow. I wonder if that is because of the nature of raw milk. I know breastmilk, for example doesn't go bad as easily as store-bought cow's milk. Thanks for sharing the tip! jonesx6 (1606) 01 May 2007 05:32 AMIn the summer it does tend to sour a bit quicker but I don't have to throw the sour milk out. I will just make some baked oatmeal, or something along those lines. We go through more milk in the winter time then in the summer. Yesterday we pulled out a half of gallon of milk from the freezer. I left it out for most of the day and it was still pretty frozen. I didn't want to leave it out all night so I put it in the fridge and pulled it out this morning so it could finish thawing out. Laura Community Tags bulk food, food storage, freezing milk, milk Discuss this article
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