The Blonde City Girl

Begin the week with laughter
The Boy's Dad sent this to me, and figured he be safe since "you are are country girl, who just happens to be in the city."

The Laughing Cow
p.s. I love their cheese

A blonde city girl named Jennifer marries an Oklahoma rancher. One morning, on his way out to check on the cows, the rancher says to Jennifer, 'The insemination man is coming over to impregnate one of our cows today, so I drove a nail into the 2 by 4 just above where the cow's stall is in the barn. Please show him where the cow is when he gets here, OK?'

The rancher leaves for the fields. After a while, the artificial insemination man arrives and knocks on the front door. Jennifer takes him down to the barn. They walk along the row of cows and when Jennifer sees the nail, she tells him, 'This is the one right here.' The man, assuming he is dealing with an air head blond, asks, 'Tell me lady, 'cause I'm dying to know; how would YOU know that this is the right cow to be bred?'

'That's simple," she said. "By the nail that's over its stall,' she explains very confidently.

Laughing rudely at her, the man says, 'And what, please tell, is the nail for?'  The blond turns to walk away and says sweetly over her shoulder, 'I guess it's to hang your pants on.'

(It's nice to see a blond winning once in awhile.)

Cow, goat, rice or soy milk - what do you prefer

I'm all about sporting g a milk mustache.

Prize winning dairy
cows at the World Dairy Expo

Recently, I have been spending a little more time in the dairy section of my grocery store. I've been on the search for Greek Yogurt, I'll blog a little more about that another day. What I have noticed on my quest is the variety in "milk" options. I put milk in quotes because a lot of what you see really isn't real milk - soy milk is not milk in my opinion. It's got to come from the cow to pass my test.

However, these milk substitutes are good options for those with health concerns such as lactose intolerance.  Recently, I came across this article that talks about different milk options. It gives pros and cons of each and answered a lot of my questions.

Check out The Skinny on milk nutrition: Cow, goat, rice or soy? 

What kind of milk is in your fridge. Growing up I used to drink 2%, but after college I switched to 1%. All that same nutrition with a few less calories!

One of my favorite photos from when I photographer the World Dairy Expo a few years ago. 

p.s. I am still at the National Junior Angus Show this week. So I apologize if I don't respond to all your comments right away. I will have some updates on the Crystal Cattle facebook page. 

Dairy Cows and $800 shoes

Manolo Blahnik execs. take on dairy farming

I realize today is Turquoise Thursday, but when I saw this article I knew that Turquoise could wait one day. So come on back tomorrow and we'll talk Turquoise on Friday, and you can see what arrived in the mail for me this week. 

I can't embed the video, so you'll have to click here to watch, but the story talks about the Manolo President and Vice-President trading their New York lifestyle for the profession of dairy farmer ever Thursday through Sunday. 


I think it is pretty cool when people without agriculture backgrounds decided to take an interest in the industry that is so dear to my heart. And these guys jumped right in it. 400 head of dairy cattle, with 25 employees, and although these city boys admit they down do too much of the dirty work they aren't afraid to step into a barn. 


This morning on the Early Show two of my loves were brought together - cattle and shoes. And we aren't talking any old shoes, we are talking Manolo Blahnik shoes. I am too frugal with my money, and so lively will only ever be an admirer, but it wouldn't surprise me if my sister (check out her blog) would some day own a pair. 

You can read about Arethusa Farm, and how George Malkemus and Anthony Yurgaitis saved the farmland from developers and turned it back into a functioning dairy. And a dairy with some top show genetics. 


Now maybe I just need to figure out how I can swap places with them and work in the Manolo Blahnik shoe store a couple days a week. 

Cheese is a vegetable

Food chat from a Boy

The Boy and I have been successfully living together for more than two months now, and we love it. It is always interesting when two people come together to live under one roof and begin to share their life philosophies with each other - like cheese is a vegetable. 

Yes, the Boy believes that cheese is a vegetable and that things like brocolli is in the gross stuff category. You see the Boy isn't a big vegetable fan, although I'll give him credit that his tastes have expanded greatly since we started dating. 

One thing we do agree on is that we love cheese. If you were to look in our fridge right now you would find two bags of Parmesan, Monetary Jack, Italian and Mozzarella. There is also cottage cheese (his not mind), cream cheese, sour cream, sour cream taco dip, yogurt and milk -  yeah we are dairy fans. 

Since we have an abundance of cheese the Boy has declared that we can just subsitiute cheese into our diet as a vegetable. Probably not a great plan, but a great way to support dairy farmers. 

Any food disagreements that your family has?