Date: Wed, 13 Mar 1996 18:13:15 -0600

From: Natalie Maynor maynor[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]RA.MSSTATE.EDU

Subject: Re: Clabber milk -Reply



In our family, blue john was skim milk that had so little butterfat that it

was tasteless or even tasted a little bad. We always left enough cream in



My only experience with the term "blue john" is that my mother sometimes

laughs and says that what we regularly drink now is what "Auntie" (her

aged great aunt who lived with them for a while when my mother was a child)

would have called "blue john."



Mother had several uses for whey too. When I came across different

responses in dialect surveys (much past my teens), I just thought some

people didn't quite understand all the stages of the process, or maybe

didn't like or eat clabber. Don't we all think our family language is



I must confess that I don't understand much about the process and never

tasted clabber(ed) (milk). I do remember it, though. I remember that

my Daddy got my mother to make it for him from time to time when I was

little and that my brother and I said it looked horrible. I don't know

when/why he stopped drinking it. I do know that my memories of it are

from my early childhood, not later.

--Natalie (maynor[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]ra.msstate.edu)