3 ms·

You don't just remove fat from milk. For one because it loses taste and texture, they have to compensate by adding things like powder milk, sucrose or high-fruc

You don't just remove fat from milk. For one because it loses taste and texture, they have to compensate by adding things like powder milk, sucrose or high-fructose corn syrup and colorants amongst others. Of course the list of ingredients vary, depending on the country and on what's being banned or not. But the more interesting fact is that when stripping the fat from milk you can't just strip out 1.5% or 2%. Oh no, that's inefficient, the milk produced by cows is not that uniform and the tools we have aren't that precise. So to obtain milk with 1.5% of fat (you know, the middle one, that's usually colored with blue, sitting between the green that's 0.5% and the red that's 3.5%) ... well, for 1.5% fat they have to strip whatever they can, then re-add that fat until they get the desired percentage. And what they add back is not the same fat that they stripped. No, what they add back is vegetable fat, usually from soy and animal fat of all sorts. Like for example there could be pork fat in the cow milk that you're drinking. Disclaimer: my father is a veterinarian that has been the director of the center for food safety in my city and I live in Europe. Boy, he can tell me stories.

maxerickson 11y ago
In the US, it would be illegal to sell milk with added vegetable oils without including the vegetable oil on the label. I can buy that someone does it somewhere, I don't for a second buy that the entire dairy industry is in on it. It's also the case that the fat in store milk has been mixed into the milk, it naturally tends to separate: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homogenization_%28chemistry%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homogenization_%28chemistry%29
thaumasiotes 11y ago
With all due respect, you have no idea what you're talking about. http://stage.rosiediscovers.com/wp-content/uploads/blogger/-qai1JJcVdXI/UaudwNrIMBI/AAAAAAAAEuY/jcOQp52VUKo/s1600/Gallon%2Bof%2BLucerne%2BMilk.jpg http://stage.rosiediscovers.com/wp-content/uploads/blogger/-... http://stage.rosiediscovers.com/wp-content/uploads/blogger/-qai1JJcVdXI/UaudwNrIMBI/AAAAAAAAEuY/jcOQp52VUKo/s1600/Gallon%2Bof%2BLucerne%2BMilk.jpg http://stage.rosiediscovers.com/wp-content/uploads/blogger/-... http://ij.org/press-release/florida-skim-milk-release-11-20-2014/ http://ij.org/press-release/florida-skim-milk-release-11-20-... The milk in my fridge right now (not Lucerne -- Clover) claims the following ingredients: milk (or "low-fat milk"), nonfat milk, vitamin A palmitate, and vitamin D3. The whipping cream, which would be a place to add nonmilk fats if there was any such place, claims cream, nonfat milk solids, carrageenan, polysorbate 80, and mono- and diglycerides. There's corn syrup in the eggnog, but that's supposed to be sweet. So, to sum up: Skim milk is made by taking raw milk and removing the fat. It loses taste and texture this way, which is why I hate skim milk. It also loses appearance, becoming a sort of sickly nearly-translucent blueish-white color. Low-fat milk is made by mixing whole milk and skim milk in the appropriate proportions. Sugar is not a milk additive, nor is nonmilk fat. There is definitely not pork fat in the milk we're drinking. There is natural variation in the amount of fat present in milk. This is allowed, particularly for "whole milk". Powder milk really is used to make eggnog and whipping cream. However, it's hard to argue that adding powder milk adulterates milk. Vitamin A and/or D3 are almost always added to US milk. That's not for any cosmetic purpose; it is a public health measure.

maxerickson 11y ago

In the US, it would be illegal to sell milk with added vegetable oils without including the vegetable oil on the label. I can buy that someone does it somewhere, I don't for a second buy that the entire dairy industry is in on it. It's also the case that the fat in store milk has been mixed into the milk, it naturally tends to separate: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homogenization_%28chemistry%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homogenization_%28chemistry%29

thaumasiotes 11y ago

With all due respect, you have no idea what you're talking about. http://stage.rosiediscovers.com/wp-content/uploads/blogger/-qai1JJcVdXI/UaudwNrIMBI/AAAAAAAAEuY/jcOQp52VUKo/s1600/Gallon%2Bof%2BLucerne%2BMilk.jpg http://stage.rosiediscovers.com/wp-content/uploads/blogger/-... http://stage.rosiediscovers.com/wp-content/uploads/blogger/-qai1JJcVdXI/UaudwNrIMBI/AAAAAAAAEuY/jcOQp52VUKo/s1600/Gallon%2Bof%2BLucerne%2BMilk.jpg http://stage.rosiediscovers.com/wp-content/uploads/blogger/-... http://ij.org/press-release/florida-skim-milk-release-11-20-2014/ http://ij.org/press-release/florida-skim-milk-release-11-20-... The milk in my fridge right now (not Lucerne -- Clover) claims the following ingredients: milk (or "low-fat milk"), nonfat milk, vitamin A palmitate, and vitamin D3. The whipping cream, which would be a place to add nonmilk fats if there was any such place, claims cream, nonfat milk solids, carrageenan, polysorbate 80, and mono- and diglycerides. There's corn syrup in the eggnog, but that's supposed to be sweet. So, to sum up: Skim milk is made by taking raw milk and removing the fat. It loses taste and texture this way, which is why I hate skim milk. It also loses appearance, becoming a sort of sickly nearly-translucent blueish-white color. Low-fat milk is made by mixing whole milk and skim milk in the appropriate proportions. Sugar is not a milk additive, nor is nonmilk fat. There is definitely not pork fat in the milk we're drinking. There is natural variation in the amount of fat present in milk. This is allowed, particularly for "whole milk". Powder milk really is used to make eggnog and whipping cream. However, it's hard to argue that adding powder milk adulterates milk. Vitamin A and/or D3 are almost always added to US milk. That's not for any cosmetic purpose; it is a public health measure.