There was quite a crowd, which we expected, for the only tour at 10:30A.
Our first stop was the milking station. Shatto employs eleven people, who begin their day at 3AM milking roughly 270 cows ten at a time. Where Drew (look for the brown shirt) and the girls are standing is one of the berths where the cows stand while being milked: they let everyone stick their fingers in the suction things to see what it feels like. Each cow produces roughly 3-5 gallons per milking, and is milked twice a day.
Afterward we got to visit the calves, which Drew said had to be the highlight for the girls, petting and letting them suck on their fingers.
We also tried milking a cow: it all happened so fast and there was a guy crowding me that I couldn't get a better shot.
This is the milk processing room. Interestingly, the milk that comes in first has all the cream removed leaving skim milk. Then, in order to make the other percentages of milk, the cream is added back in. And since there's been an increasing demand in skim milk, Shatto started using the cream to make butter, ice cream and, more recently, cheese (sold only at Whole Foods?).
That's Mr Shatto's arm in the background. He led our tour through the milk processing room, and handed out samples of banana milk, orange-flavored milk (think: milk after a bowl of Fruit Loops), root beer milk and chocolate.A couple years ago, Shatto won some state small business award and got to travel to DC for an award ceremony in which President Bush would be present. He hand-carried a bottle of his chocolate milk for the Pres to taste, convinced that he wouldn't be able to get it through Secret Service. While in DC, he learned that he was runner up for the national small business award and would get to meet the Pres personally. At the meeting, he gifted his milk, and was assured that the Pres and VP, who were having lunch afterward, would be served the milk. Three weeks later, he received a call from a White House staffer telling him that the Pres had drank the milk and enjoyed it very much. Three days after that, he received a signed picture of the Pres – holding the bottle of Shatto milk in one hand and a glass of the milk in the other.
The only interest Z's ever shown in milk.
Though I couldn't hear the actual explanation, I conjecture that this a refurbished milk wagon that Shatto sometimes drives to local schools delivering milk. He even outfitted the horn to sound like a cow mooing.
You can't see her for the shadow, but G's sitting behind the wheel.
Getting in some rock time while waiting for the crowds to disperse and decide where to head for lunch.
We were shooting for Cajun Tony's in old town Liberty, but it might have gone out of business? So we had Mexican at Los Campos instead.
