The many surprising uses of milk bags

“Mom, Aunt Mel – Look!”

Everyone came pouring into the living room. Two teens proudly held out a small package. I could see something dun-coloured under the plastic, but it was unrecognizable.

“Guess what?” they said happily. “We shrink wrapped a hot-dog bun!”

“Stop putting random things through that,” Jeff groused, without any real anger in his voice. Mounds of grated zucchini were waiting for a turn in the Weenings’ new shrink-wrapping machine before being tossed in the freezer for winter. The smell of chocolate and yeast filled the kitchen. Five loaves cooled on wire racks, surrounded by batter-filled bowls. We had picked a good time to visit; Jeff’s zucchini bread is unbeatable.

“When I was a kid, you know what we did with freezer vegetables?” I said. “I had to suck out the excess air with a straw while my sisters squeezed the bags shut and tied them.” I could remember hot August afternoons and steaming mountains of blanched snijbonen on our wooden kitchen table. I wasn’t much of a green string bean fan, to be honest, even before straws and suction were involved, and that relationship never improved by the time the beans arrived on my plate a few months later.

This memory triggered a round of “back in my day” jokes from the teenagers (which is, frankly, a stage in life that seems designed to keep the egos of parents in check). “Back in my day,” they said, in fake wavering voices, “we had to eat carrots straight from the ground without digging them up first.” I scowl-laughed.

“Back in my day, we had to build our wagons while we were travelling on them.”

“Back in my day, we didn’t have these newfangled vaccines. We caught smallpox right from the cow.”

They were on such a roll that I didn’t get a chance to tell them that, back in my day, we didn’t have newfangled Ziploc bags. Instead, my mom saved milk bags – sliced open, rinsed out and hung to dry. That’s what we used to freeze snijbonen and many other vegetables. It was “the good plastic.”I mentioned those recycled milk bags in a Christian Courier email newsletter last week, reflecting on the thriftiness of a generation that lived through war. To my surprise – and delight – it triggered a flood of response.

Before it was trendy

“You had me with the milk bags,” Will wrote, from Winnipeg. “They’re in our freezer right now, filled with green beans.”

Another email came from the Annapolis Valley in Nova Scotia: “Most food in my two deep freezers is in washed milk bags,” Anne said. She sent a photo to prove it. “And yes,” she added, “I was born during WWII.”

“Conservation is not a new thing at all,” Margaret wrote from Brighton, Ontario. “When Ron and I were married we were big into gardening and preserving right away.” Her theory on when milk bags were introduced sent me on a quick google search.

Milk used to be sold by the pint in reusable glass bottles. When Canada switched to the metric system in the 1970s, it was easier for manufacturers to adjust sizes in the new plastic bags used in Europe rather than to redesign glass or plastic jugs, according to Wikipedia. In Quebec, Ontario and the Maritimes, milk bags slowly grew in popularity throughout the 1970s. They’re still not common, however, in Western Canada, as this poignant letter from Smithers, B.C., explained:

“After reading Angela’s [email] editorial, I was reminded of my mom,” Nancy said. “Reusing plastic milk bags was something she did with precision and efficiency. Seeing the value in such a durable, reusable plastic bag, she saved them, used them multiple times, and even sent some of them to me in the mail from Ontario to B.C. Regularly a letter from my parents included a flattened bundle of milk bags. I appreciated those plastic bags, because in B.C. milk only came in jugs and cartons. But even more, I treasured her letters filled with newsy narratives, and her inquiries of how life was in B.C.”

My first theory for the Invisible Community That Saves Milk Bags was war. And I think there’s still truth to that. But as I’ve heard from more people, I wonder if faith plays a role, too. Why else give an item that most people throw out a chance at new life? Even if “new life” is just beans.

Does it make any difference what we do, what we grow, what we save, what we eat?

Daily, my attention is divided. CBC radio drones in the background while I make soup and quiz Alba on irregular French verbs. Updates from the Rafah gate. Terrible, heart-rending statistics. Across Canada, loyalties are divided. The onions almost burn. Savoir is the hardest verb to learn.

The answer, as you already know, is yes. Of course it matters. Our bodies are not separate from our thoughts; our choices in everyday life signify what we value. Who we listen to, purchase from, sit next to, pray for, write to, vote for, support with ministry dollars – it all matters. Which stories, questions and statistics do we handle with care and which ones do we throw out?

Years ago, Nancy’s mom ended every letter with the same reminder: that the Lord is faithful. “Those milk bags,” Nancy concluded, “eventually ripped due to plastic fatigue, but I know the Lord’s presence and promises are more durable – they endure forever.”