Saint Benoît -- which we've covered for both its yogurt and its yogurt cheese -- is dedicated to pasture-raised Jerseys for their yogurt and cheese, and they're now packaging their milk on its own.
We found the European style glass bottle (appropriate as the Founder, Benoît, is French) at Whole Foods. It was a hit -- even my son, who only uses milk as a method of moistening cereal, said "This milk is really good." Of course, he then put the half the bowl on the floor for the cat, so I guess even great milk only goes so far.
The milk is heavily yellowed compared to traditional milk and looks like melted french vanilla ice cream. The flavor is rich, lush, and thick. The solids from the Jersey come through with a lusciousness that helps you imagine you can taste the butter within. If the French Laundry served a snack of milk and cookies, I imagine this is the milk they'd use.
The milk is whole, organic, unhomogenized, vat pasteurized (small vats are used and heated to the bare minimum of 145 degrees to maintain as much character and flavor as possible), and sells for $3.99 for a 1 liter bottle. That's $15.10 on a gallonized basis, a bit more than one wants to spend to feed cats, but a fair price in liter doses for a special occasion milk to have with those glorious hot baked goods you just pulled out of the oven.
Saint Benoît milk is available in at Rainbow Grocery, Bi-Rite, Whole Foods Markets and Real Foods. St Benoit also sells at the Ferry building Farmers market on Saturdays, Berkeley Farmers markets on Thursdays and Saturdays, Temescal Farmers market on Sundays, Palo Alto farmers market on Sundays and San Rafael Civic Center farmers market on Sundays.
