Tastes Like Home
Hi Everyone, I ran myself ragged this past Tuesday in search of a pot in which to scald milk. I visited eleven stores before I found the kind of pot I was looking for – one with the capacity to hold a gallon of milk and the requisite heavy bottom. Four and a half hours after setting out from home, I returned, tired and hot, but triumphant. I had my milk-pot!
This milk-pot-quest all started as a result of finally mustering the courage to approach the man who I see every Sunday visiting my neighbours armed with containers of fresh milk!
For over a year, I’ve watched from my patio, stretched out in the lounge chair, enjoying the breeze and the quietness that Sundays bring, as the van would pull up to the house obliquely opposite mine. The man would get out, come around from the driver’s side and slide open the door. He’d raise the lid of a cooler and bring forth 4 containers of milk. Opening the gate to my neighbour, his regular customer, he’d call out, “Hell-Looooo”. A short while later, he would return with empty containers, which were exchanged for his full ones.
As I watched this activity over the year, I’ve often wondered if it was goat’s milk or cow’s milk. Personally, it did not matter, while I had never had goat’s milk, I would be willing to try it. Cow’s milk, I’ve had before and liked it. I’ve wanted to approach the milkman for so long, to enquire and to find out if it was possible to purchase some of his milk. But alas courage failed me. You see, as some of you may know, each place has its own rhythm and pulse; there are certain things that you can do and cannot. What may be common and okay in one place is not so in another. It is no different here in Barbados. For example, you don’t drop in to visit someone unless calling to enquire if it is possible, but I digress.
I hesitated in approaching the milkman because I did not want to seem to be getting into someone else’s business, in this case knowing what type of milk my neighbour consumes. I did not want to be perceived as we say in the Caribbean, as being “fast”. In other words, minding other people’s business. I had discussed my dilemma with a friend and she waved her hand at me with impatience and said, “Look, just ask the man.” And that is exactly what I did this past Sunday. I waited patiently for him to make his delivery and with my brightest smile I approached him and haltingly asked about the milk and if it was possible to purchase some. I even told him that if he already has his quota of customers for his milk that it was okay… I just wondered… he was so kind, he smiled and told me that he can bring milk for me too. (Can you tell that I am smiling?). He delivers on Wednesdays and Sundays. I told him that I’d take delivery on Wednesdays only, one gallon.
I quickly walked back across the road, clapped my hands in glee and exclaimed to my mom (who’s visiting) that I am going to be getting fresh cow’s milk! Honestly, you would not be able to tell that this sort of enthusiasm for milk is coming from someone who is lactose intolerant (lactose intolerance is the inability or insufficient ability to digest lactose, a sugar found in milk and dairy products). Whenever I want to consume dairy, I take a lactase enzyme that aids in my digestion of milk and dairy foods.
And thus, the quest for a milk-pot started. I declared that I wanted a pot solely dedicated to my milk; nothing else was to contaminate the vessel, save of course the making of rice pudding, sago pudding, paynoose or ice cream custards.
You may think that a gallon of milk is a lot for me to get but given that mom is here, she’ll be drinking milk as a source of her calcium intake and unlike me, she takes coffee and tea daily. When she returns home, I’ll only take half a gallon (2 quarts, 4 pints, 8 cups), which will get me through a week. I began to have visions of how I’d use the milk – teas, smoothies, cooking and baking. But most exciting of all, I was looking forward to being able to eat the cream or skin that forms on top of the milk when it has been scalded a few times. I love that with a bit of sugar. Yum!
My first introduction to fresh milk and cow’s milk was at the home of my uncle who lived in the countryside. Whenever we’d visit during the August holidays, I’d hear the milkman either ring a bell or blow a horn and my aunt would go to the gate with her designated milk-pot in hand. The milkman would dip his tin-cup into the chilled milk can and fill up the pot. My aunt would scald the milk and then make tea for everyone.
Being a “town-girl”, I’d only ever seen milk poured from a can bought in the store. We used evaporated milk. However, there was a time when we were younger that someone used to bring milk to our home. It was brought directly from the milk plant and my mom would scald her milk daily, in the morning and the evening in her designated milk-pot. I used to like watching the milk come to a boil, start to rise and then turn off the heat just before the milk reached the rim of the pot. You know, me being a daredevil and all.
My aunt, Betty, used to buy fresh cow’s milk too and after she introduced us to paynoose (milk curds cooked with spices and sugar) I used to wish often that hers and mommy’s milk would curdle just so that paynoose could be made! One day here in Barbados, I got such a craving for this treat that I bought a half gallon of milk and curdled it with lemon juice just so that I could have paynoose. Don’t judge me.
So, here I am, years later, excited at the prospect of having fresh cow’s milk and having my own milk-pot. After I had unsuccessfully visited the tenth store, I sat in the car and asked myself: Can you not use one of the pots you have just for this week and give yourself some time over the weekend to continue the search for a milk-pot? Perhaps, I thought. But if there is one thing you must know about me, it is that I can become obsessed with something until I get it. I reasoned with myself as I pulled into the parking lot of the eleventh store, that if I did not find a suitable pot there, I’d use one of the pots I have and vowed to find a milk-pot by the weekend.
I walked into the store, headed to the pots and pans section and my eyes immediately fell on a particular pot. After reading the specs on the box, lifting the pot to test the weight and tapping the bottom and sides for thickness; holding the handle in various ways and mentally converting 4.5 quart to gallons, I picked up one of the unopened boxes and headed to the cash register.
At the time of writing this column, my milk-pot has been washed and dried. It’s awaiting the arrival of the milkman this evening.
Cynthia
tasteslikehome@gmail.com
www.tasteslikehome.org