National Milk Day — 11 January

Not to be confused with World Milk Day on June 1, National Milk Day falls on January 11 to observe the very first time milk was delivered to homes inside sterilized glass bottles. It took until 1878 before anybody thought to fill bottles with milk and seal them with waxed paper. Before that, conditions for storing milk (let alone delivering it) were unsanitary at best and downright hazardous at worst. But now that we have the technology to pasteurize and deliver fresh milk to homes, stores, and processing facilities across the country, this most basic type of dairy is more accessible than ever before. By today’s standards, milk with its nine essential nutrients is considered a staple food, technically able to support human life without the addition of any other food groups to balance it out. (Other life-supporting foods include sourdough bread, chicken eggs, red beans, and surprisingly, beer!) Of course, most of us aren’t on a milk-only diet, but milk is our very first food as babies and often remains a common source of nutrition throughout our adult lives. For National Milk Day, we invite you to join us in celebrating the oldest and arguably the most natural food for all the mammals of the world — milk.