New Vrindaban

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"A Jersey's the smallest, easiest to keep and gives the highest percentage of butterfat. Holsteins are considerably larger and give more-although not as rich-milk. We milk our cows each morning and evening, and we do it by hand. We refuse to get involved in the karma of milking machines. We have enough manpower to do the job by hand and it usually takes a person about a month to learn to milk well."

"Do you sell the milk?"

"Not yet. The community drinks it plain or consumes it as buttermilk, cheese, curd, ice cream, sour cream, hand-churned butter or yogurt."

"Oh, I've always wanted to know how to make cheese. How do you do it?"

"For one excellent hard cheese we simply boil the milk and add a coagulator like sour salt—although lemon or lime juice will do—and then drain the cheese in cloth overnight. It's delicious with or without salt. For curds, we just heat sour milk slowly until the curds form, then drain it and add fresh cream."

As Hayagriva and I carried on our conversation we passed a half dozen cottages and an orchard of young apple, cherry and pear trees that the community planted a couple of years ago. Further along the grass road was a grove of sassafras trees and blackberry bushes . . . and then we turned to go up the hill to the A-frame at the crest. The view of the horizon all around with nine ridges visible in one direction was tremendous.

Hayagriva pointed out Madhuban—where I had stood earlier that day—on the opposite slope and, then commented that the A-frame at this commanding location was the first house built by the community. "It's more elaborate than the others," he said, "we made many mistakes on this one and had to rebuild a lot. For instance, we originally cut windows into the roof . . . but they leaked and we had to take them out and put in dormers. The house cost twice what it should have—$1,500 after the tile floor was in—and we won't try anything like it again. It's just not economical."

"What do you consider economical?"

"The 10 x 16 rectangular cottages down below. They're situated on inexpensive pier foundations of cinder blocks, stones or concrete that extend below the frost line. We span the piers with double 2 x 8's which, in turn, are spanned with ten-foot 2 x 6 floor joists spaced 16 inches on center. Then we lay a 3/8-inch plywood or planking floor which we use as a work table on which we prefab the wall framework of 2 x 4's spaced at 16-inch intervals with considerations for doorways and windows. Once the walls are roughed in they're raised into position, plumbed and squared. We next apply an exterior covering of plyboard and battens or Celotex and siding.

"The rafters are then notched and the roof covered with sheathing or plywood and tar paper, shingles or roll roofing. We finish the interior by installing fiberglass insulation and covering it with sheetrock and we've found aluminum slide windows simple to install and a bargain for the money."

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