By Kathleen Dayton

WADMALAW ISLAND -- Dairy cows are mooving back to at least one local farm as farmers across the state discover a niche created by the growing demand for organic products.

George and Celeste Albers will launch their raw, “straight from the cow” bottled milk May 11 after receiving permitting from the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control and passing a rigorous inspection process. The milk will debut at the Charleston Farmers Market and will also be sold off the farm to individual consumers.

Not all states allow the sale of raw milk, which has not been pasteurized or homogenized.

“We’re lucky to be in South Carolina, where we can legally do it, but we have a more stringent inspection process. Our milk has to be very, very clean,” said Celeste Albers of Green Grocer Farm on Wadmalaw Island.

Raw milk cannot be sold to restaurants in South Carolina or to supermarkets that prepare food on premises, but can be sold straight to the consumer through farmers’ markets and produce stands, or straight off the farm.

Albers said she is tapping into a growing business.

“We have five cows and I expect to be expanding rather rapidly,” Albers said. “There appears to be a big demand.”

Neighbors have already told Albers they are interested in buying Green Grocer’s milk and she has been contacted by local nutritionists including Marti Chitwood, founder of Viriditas Rejuvenation Center, a Charleston wellness center focused on nutrition and natural foods.

“There are more and more people wanting raw and organic milk. I’m pleased to know there’s a resource,” Chitwood said. “There are many problems with homogenized, pasteurized dairy products that sort of dumb down one’s immune system, and our digestive systems really have a hard time digesting it. Raw milk retains Mother Nature’s helpers to digest milk and the immune molecules that are supportive of the immune system.”

Chitwood, a clinical nutritionist and registered dietician, said milk is one of the first foods she removes from many patients’ diets, particularly those who have nasal and respiratory congestion or digestive complaints.

Raw milk contains more vitamins and enzymes to help the body use the lactose in milk. The homogenization process puts milk under tremendous pressure and breaks up the fat globules so that they aren’t used as they should be, Albers said.

“There’s a lot of people who lose weight or feel better when they switch to un-homogenized milk,” she said.

Like any raw food, raw milk can have risks if the dairy farmer is not following the proper processes.