Every Friday, Rod and Sue Cloose load up their delivery truck -- the one emblazoned with images of their Holsteins -- and make the 5 1/2-hour drive from their farm near Bemidji, Minn., to the Twin Cities, arriving just in time to catch some sleep before setting up shop Saturday morning at the Minneapolis Farmers Market.
As dairy farmers in the far northern reaches of the state, they're practically an endangered species. "In 1972 there were 326 dairy farms in Beltrami County," said Sue. "Now there are nine." To prevent their livelihood from becoming a depressing statistic, the couple decided to change it. "Conventional wisdom was that we should get huge," said Sue, which meant tending 250 to 1,000 cows and selling the output to a mega-bottler. Instead, the couple cut back to about 60 animals and they process the milk themselves on their 85-acre farm.
One reason why Blackstar's milk ($2.50 a half-gallon, $5 a gallon) sports an unusually rich flavor and pearly, luminescent color is that the Clooses operate in a nonhomogenized zone. That it is so darned fresh doesn't hurt, either; at Blackstar, the average travel time between cow and carton is roughly six hours.
The dairy's lusciously thick, super-fatty cream ($3 a pint) is sold with a word of caution. "You have to be careful when you're whipping it," said Sue. "Watch it closely, because it can turn to butter instantly." She does not exaggerate. In less than a minute my trusty KitchenAid mixer had converted the cream into the dairy equivalent of cumulus clouds, and my guess is that another 15 seconds would have had me cutting the results into ¼-pound sticks. "It's worth $3," Sue said, another understatement.
No wonder the Clooses have built a steady clientele over the summer. "Once we get our milk in their hands, people become repeat customers," said Rod. The only obstacle? Weight. A gallon tips the scales at 8.6 pounds. "No one wants to carry that around the market," he said. "So people pick it up on their way out."
RICK NELSON
Blackstar Dairy, Saturday (6 a.m. to 1 p.m.) at the Minneapolis Farmers Market, 312 E. Lyndale Av. N., 612-333-1718, www.mplsfarmersmarket. com. The dairy's milk and cream are also sold at the Wedge Co-op in Minneapolis and Mississippi Market and Hampden Park Co-op in St. Paul.
StarTribune.com Find milk recipes at the Taste food and restaurants blog, startribune.com/tabletalk.
