In this house, ice cream is made with at least six egg yolks, about one cup of sugar, and as much cream and whole milk as is available and one feels like using. That's the recipe I learned from the housemate and it works really well, meaning, the ice cream is scrumptious.
We use our own homemade maple sugar to make the ice cream, and eggs from our chickens, and milk from the cows that generously live here on the farm with us. I have never used store bought sugar to make a batch of ice cream. There is a bit of store bought sugar in the cupboard, left here by a dear friend after her bread baking, week-long visit. If for some reason, I can't imagine what, but if I did use that store bought sugar to make a batch of ice cream, I would be sure to label it as such so that the housemate would know. Then he would be free to make his own decision about whether or not he wanted to eat it, or just make a different batch with home made sugar. Same with the eggs. Sometimes I bring eggs home from the food bank, and I would never use them to make a batch of ice cream. (They are fed to the dogs and kitties.) If for some strange reason I did use those eggs, I would label the ice cream as such so that the housemate could make his own decision about eating it or just waiting for a fresh batch made with our farm eggs.
Drinking whole milk is very important to me. Communicating clearly is very important to me. The housemate regularly skims cream off of containers of milk and them replaces the container in the refrigerator as if it was whole milk. I just want to know if its whole milk from the cow or if it has been skimmed so that I can make my own decision about whether I want to drink it or wait until the next day when, praise the Lord, there will be fresh whole milk.
A container of milk can be skimmed for all of its cream and the resulting skim milk can be fed to the animals. Housemate has said out loud that he just takes off enough cream for a small batch of hot chocolate, its not enough cream to make any difference. Then he puts the container back in the fridge, unlabeled, so that no one but him will know that the milk in that container is no longer whole milk. I just want to know so that I can make my own choice. Housemate has also said that sometimes he just pours off the top milk, not agitating the container prior, so all the cream that has risen to the top flows out. Then he replaces the container back in the fridge as if it were whole milk. He said that maybe he has changed the milk from 5% cream to 4.97% cream and it shouldn't matter. I just want to know so that I can make my own choice.
It's just good manners to skim a milk container of all its cream and leave the cream in a jar in the fridge so anyone else who wants cream can have it, then the fully skimmed container can be placed in the animal feed area.
This is all so silly trying to write it down and explain, but I finally received the ice cream analogy and writing makes me feel better so here it is. All this milk container and skimming and cream and all of it has just been figured out over time and experience. Its been fun to discover little systems for using and enjoying the milk. There's a sweet little decorative patch from Holler Fest that I use to label the cream jar. I just place the square patch on the jar in the fridge and then housemate knows that is the fresh cream. Sometimes there can be two or three jars of cream in the fridge at once, but I always put the patch on the fresh jar. Its just polite. I enjoy communicating clearly.
All things change and it will be nice when this gets easier. So that is why I threw the milk, because I was so upset after years and years of discussing this, arguing about it, developing systems of communication and I was still not sure if the milk in the fridge was whole milk or 4.97% cream, as he says. When I saw the milk that I threw, all over my child's legos, his sweet little lego table covered in milk, something broke inside me. I was released. Energy shifted and I've been free ever since.
Drinking whole milk is NOT more important than my own peace. I choose my own peace over any sad little skimming games housemate wants to play. I have my integrity and I still would never make a batch of ice cream with anything but farm ingredients. I realized that day, as I gazed at lego pieces covered in yucky, sticky milk, that I don't have to throw the milk. I have a choice. Always. In every moment, I have a choice. I can be upset and hurt that my housemate doesn't communicate clearly, AND I don't have to throw milk. I can choose my own peace.
I am not sorry it happened. I cherish this new freedom that I claimed that day. I appreciate the opportunity to see more clearly how free I am. I don't have to throw the milk.
