Where is my milk from?

I found a website (that I don't think has been mentioned here before) that can be used to find out where milk products come from, using the product codes printed (usually) on or near the top of the container: www.whereismymilkfrom.com.

I just tried it out and found out that my Roundy's (Mariano's) half and half came from White Bear Lake, Minnesota (just east of St. Paul), and my Dean's buttermilk came from Harvard, Illinois.

Here's a link to a similar discussion from many years ago. http://lthforum.com/bb/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=7988. In this case, it was about butter and there is a lot of info in the thread about dairy plant numbers and what they mean.

Katie wrote:I just tried it out and found out that my Roundy's (Mariano's) half and half came from White Bear Lake, Minnesota (just east of St. Paul), and my Dean's buttermilk came from Harvard, Illinois.

Actually, the Dean's buttermilk undoubtedly came from their plant in Chemung, a small town next to Harvard, IL. That's Dean's largest fluid milk plant, producing a wide variety of products. Dean also has a fluid milk plant in Huntley, but that's strictly fluid milk (whole, skim, 1% and 2%).

I wish there was something like this for meat. They say there are only a few large scale producers of beef and most everything comes from there unless you buy it locally from a farmer.

toria wrote:I wish there was something like this for meat. They say there are only a few large scale producers of beef and most everything comes from there unless you buy it locally from a farmer.

That would be wonderful, and possible, too, since the facility numbers on the USDA inspection label are a matter of public record -- see this link for an index, or go directly here for a numerical list (758 page .pdf).

Thanks very much for the info on the "Where is my milk from" website!

We have been playing with the code-finder and we have been very intrigued to see that some big house-brands of milk are from the same plants as Dean's milk. Jewel-brand milk, WalMart's Great Value milk and Sam's Club Daily Chef milk all track back to Dean's plants in either Huntley or Harvard IL.

To me this says why pay more than $4 a gallon for Dean's at these stores when a gallon of the house brand is from the same plant and is as low as $2 plus change? I have a hard time imagining that they run two different streams of milk through these plants.

I put a shortcut to the code-finder on my smart phone and intend to try it on other dairy. --Joy

At least when I was working there, some of the Dean-branded milks had slightly higher levels of milk solids than the store-branded milks, making them taste a bit richer. But it was a pretty subtle difference.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErRHJlE4PGI

Here is an updated link to the USDA list of dairy plants:
http://apps.ams.usda.gov/dairy/ApprovedPlantList/

here is a link to a page for querying poultry and egg processors:
http://apps.ams.usda.gov/plantbook/Quer ... _Query.asp

It includes an option to search by plant number, I don't know if processor plant numbers are listed on poultry or egg packaging.

There are plant codes on egg cartons. I have a carton of "365 organic" brown eggs with a code "8WI 628-064". The 628 denotes the plant number, which in this case is the Reedsburg Egg Company in Reedsburg WI.

Only plants that are part of the USDA voluntary grading program are listed.

Milk Jumps Onto the Small-Batch Bandwagon

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/13/dinin ... -ipad&_r=0

Dave148 wrote:

Milk Jumps Onto the Small-Batch Bandwagon

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/13/dinin ... -ipad&_r=0

By Kevin Pang!

God I love LTH-where else can you find such useful info! Our milk is home delivered Oberweiss and I have seen small farms in Wisconsin display signage that they supply to Oberweiss. BTW, we love the milk and have had no problems with delivery and billing. Wish we had done it sooner.