CT Food

You kind of have a stop-the-presses moment when you hear that someone has started – not closed — a dairy in Connecticut. That would be our Connecticut? The one that had 6,233 dairy farms in 1940 and as of about a week ago had 150 (and that includes goat’s milk) according to the Agriculture Department?

It would be that very same Connecticut.

And this new dairy, Arethusa Farm Dairy in Litchfield, is generating a bit of a buzz because – well a few reasons and one of them is shoes. Yes shoes. Manolo Blahniks to be precise. Those shoes that pretty much are synonymous with “Sex and the City.”

It’s a lot less kinky than your mind is probably thinking right now. The owners of Arethusa are George Malkemus and Anthony Yurgaitis, president and vice president, respectively, of Manolo USA. For the last half-dozen years they’ve used the farm they bought in 1999 to breed prize-winning Holstein and Jersey cows. But with the recession and the lousy exchange rate, cow breeding ain’t what it used to be, which must be pretty bad if the terrible economics of the dairy business is looking good.

As of a couple of weeks ago Arethusa is in business, producing what it’s calling “milk like it used to taste.”

“I can give almost anyone 2% milk and they will swear it’s whole milk,” says business manager Bill Burgess who is also president and executive director of the Litchfield Hills Food Systems.

So here’s the deal. Arethusa – which I am told is the name of an orchid that used to grow on the farm — is now milking about 80 of its 475 Jerseys and Holsteins. Now remember, these are highly pampered prize cows who get their tails shampooed daily as well as getting their whole bodies showered and vacuumed weekly. And remember further, that part of what makes them prize winners is their milk.

The milk is being pasteurized and bottled at Fish Family Farm, an artisan milk producer in Bolton, which use vat pasteurization. That means they do a small amount at a time, at a lower temperature, but for a longer time than the more common flash pasteurization does.

“It preserves the farm fresh flavor,” Burgess says of the slower process.
“What you end up with is kind of like a golden milk.”

Regulations allow Arethusa to bottle 150,000 pounds of milk a month, which equals about 225,000 gallons a year. At the moment there are three products – whole milk, 2% and half-and-half, available in half-gallons. And that would be somewhat pricey half gallons. The whole milk and 2% wholesale at $3.15 a half-gallon, the half-and-half at $4.85. The retail prices go up from there.

Burgess says it’s priced to compete with organic milk, even though it’s not. The sentiment, he says, is that local, fresh milk produced sustainably trumps organic these days and customers are willing to pay for it.

This is no mission of milk mercy for Malkemus and Yurgaitis, Burgess says. “They are passionate about what they do,” he says. They bought into the premise that this is worth doing. Make no mistake about it they’re in it for a profit.”

In the meantime – Arethusa is already at New Morning in Woodbury, Whole Foods in West Hartford, LaBonne’s Market in Salisbury and Watertown and at the Litchfield Hills Farm Fresh Market on Saturdays. And coming soon to the Big Y in Torrington and Stop and Shop in Litchfield. While it might seem nice to take a drive to the farm, see the cows and buy the milk – it is, curiously, NOT available at the farm.