If there’s a grilled cheese sandwich in hell, it’s made with this. Let me introduce ya’ll to the next product voted Most Likely to Sicken Innocent Consumers.

There is an unregulated ingredient called Milk Protien Concentrate that appears in Kraft Singles, Velveeta, Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, and host of other like-kind food products. Basically, MPC is the gunk that’s left over from dairy processing.

MPC’s most appropriate use is for glue.

Kraft may not be the only company that hauls in this dairy waste product by the tons from unregulated sources overseas, but it is the most notorious. Ya see, using lots of MPC means less real milk, less real cheese. In short, it’s cheap.

Milk Protien Concentrate is NOT an approved food ingredient in the United States. It has not even been defined as what it is, exactly, by the FDA. ( how do you describe “gunk” scientifically?) Therefore, no standards for purity or nutritional value exist for MPC. Yet somehow, giant food agri-businesses companies like Kraft are positioning themselves to get away with murder. Hopefully it won’t come to that, but we’re talking the same kind of “protiens” China uses in it’s food products, and we know how well that’s turned out for their baby formulas, pet foods, and the like.

MPC is a dairy waste product. Not a food product. Because it’s not a food product, it’s snuck into the United States under cheaper tariffs. And then used for food. Ain’t that smart?

And because the source of the MPC in your slice of Kraft singles can be literally from a dozen countries, a contamination would be impossible to trace back to the point of orgin.

In the Fair Reporting sense that I honor, I’ll note here that not all Kraft products contain MPC’s. But because many of them do, you must read the ingredient label to know what you’ve got. Milk Protien Concentrate means you’re eating something that isn’t fit for human consumption.

The risk of mass food contamination is nothing new and it’s growing worse. The problem stems from outdated FDA regulations, lax or non-existent food inspections both home and abroad, economic pressures to be ever-cheaper for those Walmart shelves, and free trade agreements that resulted in corporate access to international garbage that can be re-packaged and disguised as food.

What’s more, big agri-companies like Kraft want the FDA to re-define what milk is, exactly, and what ice cream is, and what yogurt is, so that they can use more MPC in their products.

Don’t be surprised that Kraft doesn’t care about consumer health and product quality. After all, they’re owned by Philip Morris, a proud maker of cigarettes. They’re not easily daunted by things like serious illnesses brought on by the use of their product. Or lawsuits.

MPC hurts American dairy farmers who are already suffering from low milk prices. The mass importing of MPC as a substitute for real, honest food also puts the public at needless risk.

Mufn recently asked me a question that was important enough that I’m choosing to answer it here, in front of the Whole Universe.

She asked, “What’s your direction and how are you planning to get there?”

It’s more of a personal dream than a direction, maybe, because it’s got diddly-squat to do with my current career. It has nothing to do with my current job, that feels like it’s killing me slowly. ( and painfully. Aaaiiigh!! Eeeyaah! *Gasp cough wheeze* sorry, cheap theatrics there.)

I want a farm. Ya know, the works. House, barn(s), animals, pastures, crops, a tractor, the whole Green Acres experience in a box. This is what I’d call my last remaining dream from early youth.

I’ve long since realized I won’t be doing any NASCAR racing in my lifetime. I’ve even accepted the fact that once I’m done restoring my 67 Impala, I’m not likely to put it on the drag strip, either. Gone are the days where I’m looking to risk my life, or my classic car, on a 13-second thrill. At most, I might get a beater Monte Carlo someday and slam it around the dirt oval, trading paint with other home-grown stock cars in the rutted clay that remains to those of us who can’t afford to race anywhere else.

I realized as well, years ago, that I’d never make it as a professional drummer. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I was damn good. But I was working at an early age, and doing things for money that were more consistent. I can’t say I haven’t had my 15 minutes of fame with music. I have, on the local level and at an earlier time. Today, my drum set is in disrepair, and I can’t justify the expense of replacing it or completely refurbishing it when I’ve got so many other things competing for my paycheck. It’s not like I’d run out and immediately join a rock band at this juncture, anyway.

The last remaining dream is to own a farm. Sometimes this one seems damn impossible, too. Land prices where I live are sky high. Development pressures are intense. I don’t have any family members who own a farm. I have zip, zero, nada, to inherit.

But @#$% it, I wanna FARM!! I insist. I’m not taking no for an answer. I want to go to work in the morning by just walkin’ out my own back door. I want to look at some acres of rolling green and know that it’s mine.

My odds of achieving this are pretty slim, but I’ve got a couple of advantages that might make the difference. Namely, I have two people in my household who want the same thing.

If we fail to get our own farm, we’re no worse off than if we’d never tried. So the first stage of planning is just admitting this is what we want. Committing to it. It’s scary as hell to commit to a new goal, or direction, or a dream, because you don’t wanna experience the disappointment of having it not happen. Or having it not work out.

But I can’t accept the idea of going under the sod someday when my time is done, without ever having tried to cultivate it. There’s a weird sorta fatalism that actually works for me this way. I’m gonna die eventually. I’ve got an unknown amount of time to squeeze in what I want outta life, in the time that remains. I’d better freakin’ hustle.

Next, and probably most importantly… I gather information. Tons of information. I read. I go to workshops and seminars. I subscribe to local farming news. I pay sharp attention things that effect agriculture on the local, national, and global level. Recently, I had a mental breakthrough when I realized that a good core of my finance and marcoeconomic bents, would have ample exercise in unwraveling the ins and outs of the Chicago Board of Trade/Mercantile Exchange commodity system. Boy howdy.

Meanwhile, my roommates, and future business partners, study as well. One is attending ag school as I write this. We all study, learn, network with people in the industry. We make contacts whenever possible. We’re data-gathering continually.

I don’t have all the “how” worked out yet, on swinging a real estate purchase as monumental as this. But we’re doing our best to figure out how to make the place operate successfully once we get it. And so the last component, but not least, is faith.

I once thought I’d never own a house. My old blog entries speak to the efforts and thoughts on that front. I also wondered if I’d ever fix my Impala and I’d often bemoan the long list of repairs it needed. Well, it still needs a lot of work, but I started on that too. It wasn’t all that long ago where I’d posted both of those desires on a certain website – to buy a house and fix up the Impala – and looking back, I’d say there was value in admitting those wants to the world.

I can’t take entire credit for making it this far, however. The house purchase involved timing that was nothing short of miraculous. But to my own credit, I will say that I prepared, and prepared, and prepared for that transaction. I saved up all the money I could. I studied the hell out of my local market and I never stopped looking at houses. I had to be ready when the opportunity came. And I was.

I’m applying that same strategy towards getting a farm. I can’t flip a switch and get a farm overnight. Nor can I make this happen completely on my own. All I can do, is learn everything I can, and be as prepared as I can, with my finances in order and a business plan at the ready. Then, I can spring into action when that opportunity comes up.

Then, my cousins n’ friends, you all are gonna be invited to one hell of a party. Meanwhile, I hope that something in my rambling thoughts helps you approach your own goals.

If your goals involve living on a farm, maybe we should talk, eh? I’m sure my roommates will understand when I tell ‘em we have to make room for one more… or two…or three, or… wow, I’m gonna need a bigger farmhouse. Heh!