Impossible Foods Is Now Developing a Plant-Based Alternative To Cow's Milk (gizmodo.com) 181
From a report: There's a myriad of reasons to replace cow's milk with alternatives like nut milks, oat milk, or soy milk, but for those who enjoy the experience of consuming animal-sourced dairy products, the alternatives just aren't the same. So Impossible Foods, makers of the Impossible Burger and other plant-based meat alternatives, are working on another food replacement that looks, tastes, and behaves like cow's milk. During a virtual press conference this morning where Impossible Foods revealed it was doubling the size of its Silicon Valley-based research and development team over the next year while also launching what it calls the "Impossible Investigator project" to entice leading scientists to contribute to its cause, the company also gave the world its first look at its new plant-based cow's milk alternative that hasn't yet been dubbed with a catchy marketing name. (Although you can probably safely assume that Impossible Milk is an option being considered.) Like the company's flagship Impossible Burgers, Impossible Foods' new milk alternative is made with stable proteins sourced from plants. The idea is that it not only properly mixes with other liquids (like hot coffee) without forming precipitates that can alter the texture and drinking experience, but that it can also be whipped into a foam and used as an ingredient in other food products without having to modify a recipe as is often required with other substitutes.
Don't use the name "impossible". (Score:2)
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Re:Don't use the name "impossible". (Score:5, Funny)
Inconceivable Foods?
Spurious Comestibles?
I Can't Believe It's a Food?
Re:Don't use the name "impossible". (Score:5, Funny)
I don't think that word means what you think it does.
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you keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Possibly Food (Score:3)
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Impossible Foods needs a better name.
Sorry, but the name sticks until you prove the short term and long-term effects of consuming this "food". From what I hear, the planet may not benefit from humans consuming red meat over "meat", but you likely will.
Yeah, I'd say we should take the name with a pinch of salt, but they seem to use way more than a pinch.
The only question is whether they'll use salt in the milk, too....
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From what I hear, the planet may not benefit from humans consuming red meat over "meat", but you likely will.
Sure, but you don't need anything like the quantity you're currently eating. Worse: Too much is actually bad for you.
Maybe one out of ten meals could be "The Real Thing" and we'd all benefit (both you and the planet).
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You're halfway to being right in that we should cut down on the amount of meat we should be eating, but we shouldn't be replacing it with processed food made in a lab. We can easily replace it lentils, beans and many other nutritous foods.
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Remember when COVID was going through the grocery stores and meat was harder to get? Even then they couldn't sell impossible burgers.
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Yes I do. I was hoping the fake meat was available but it was long gone in my area.
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AFAIK HFCS was never widely considered as a "healthy" equivalent to sugar. Just basically equivalent to it. Which it is. The main problem with it is that it's dirt cheap, and people get addicted to sugary snacks and drinks (regardless of what sugar you use), so it started showing up in large quantities everywhere.
All sugars are instant energy to the body without providing any meaningful feeling of fullness. So if you're not burning them off, there's obviously the risk of weight gain.
As a vegetarian... as f
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What's really ridiculous is I see people buying the "real sugar" sodas that have 170 sugar calories, vs. 140 in a normal Coke, because it's "healthier". I'm guessing they also think it tastes better, and it's got what plants crave.
I also see people putting their obese kids on "juice cleanses" where they sustain themselves on nothing but liquid sugar for weeks at a time. Take the juice cleanse challenge! Preferably, you buy it at Starbucks prices from a drive-thru somewhere.
People make this way more complica
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I'm still waiting for "inorganic food"
Someone should tell them (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Someone should tell them (Score:5, Insightful)
Factory farming of cows to make milk has a huge environmental impact.
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There is an interesting end game here
Yes, CAFOs (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations) have a huge impact on the environment, from tainted well water (excess nitrogen can result in heart defects, look up Blue Babies) to alga blooms that kill fish and pollute shellfish.
Vegans would also claim that the cows are abused and reject milk products for that reason
I would offer that an improved method of producing milk without cows (and the further step of producing meat without cows), would result in complete dep
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Re:Someone should tell them (Score:5, Interesting)
...and that is bad? Cows are artificial, and practically an invasive species with our help. Plus you'd have significantly less methane to deal with.
Invasive is one way of putting it, but the ecological niche they're invading was occupied by an incumbent. The bison. Essentially big, hairy, considerably less friendly... cows. If the species we farm had tried to displace the bison on their own, they would have lost. Despite our help displacing the bison, there has been no change whatsoever in the amount of atmospheric methane contributed by the ungulates of North America. There are only slightly more cows in North America today than there were bison before Europeans arrived, and by weight, there is less cow than there was bison.
The bison marched across the continent, eating the grass and burping and farting and shitting everywhere they went. Their methane production was massive. There were so many of them, they were the driving force maintaining the Great Plains grassland ecosystem. Without them, the Great Plains would have been considerably more forested than it was. Bison destroy young trees. North America's tree cover has been recovering for the past century, and is now at a century high. Thanks to concentrated feeding operations, North American tree cover could exceed the cover it had prior to the arrival of Europeans. The various Plains Indian tribes are known to have conducted controlled burns, which did contribute some to keeping the trees in check, but by far the biggest influence was the bison themselves. Now that the cattle of North America are all fenced in, the trees are taking over.
If we eliminate the cattle we have today, we will drastically reduce the amount of methane production to far below the natural rate that has been present since the retreat of the glaciers 12,000 years ago.
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I find that very hard to believe based on the mammal species biomasses. We've known that humans and cattle are like three orders of magnitude outside the normal brackets governing every other species, and we've known the exact reasons for that. Now you're saying that bison was the natural exception for some reason? Why bison, of all things?
The biomass models are wrong or irrelevant. Reality differs. You don't have to believe me. The bison herds of North America numbered over a million strong 400 years ago. This has been the commonly accepted estimate for decades based on data as detailed as the numbers of hides shipped back to Europe which is known from surviving shipping manifests. Western Europeans killed bison by the hundreds of thousands solely for their hides, leaving the carcasses to rot, a waste and a travesty both to us now as we
Re:Someone should tell them (Score:5)
Having worked with cattle some, I say, good. Cattle can drive a man to swear and drink! I can get angry just seeing one out in a field (doubly so when it's on my side of the fence)! Yes cattle can cause a guy to have issues.
Seriously, would it be so bad to have nearly perfect beef and milk substitutes from plant-based proteins and compounds and not raise cattle? I think this is great. I like beef and milk but I don't care where it comes from as long as it tastes good.
The only issue with eliminating cattle is that it's looking more and more like cattle, both grazing and manure spreading, are essential to regenerative approaches to agriculture and food production. If cattle are eliminated, then synthetic and mined fertilizers become even more depended on. Of course there are other factors. Nitrogen fixing bacteria will hopefully be developed to replace carbon-intensive synthetic nitrates, and eventually we'll have to close the loop on the phosphate cycle by 100% recycling nutrients out of human waste and returning it to the farms.
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If cattle are eliminated, then synthetic and mined fertilizers become even more depended on.
I seriously doubt that. Intensive farming requiring mined fertilizers is need to grow food for livestock. Crops include corn and soybeans. Modern large scale agriculture has not been sustainable using animal manure for fertilizer for over a hundred years. It strikes me as a bit perverse to raise cattle a shit producers.
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The only issue with eliminating cattle is that it's looking more and more like cattle, both grazing and manure spreading, are essential to regenerative approaches to agriculture and food production.
They are NOT. Cattle is absolutely HARMFUL to agriculture and nature overall.
The main issue is that cattle doesn't actually generate fixed nitrogen, they just concentrate it. So to get nitrogen for a certain amount of agricultural land, you have to let cattle graze a much bigger area of grassland. In reality most cattle is just fed corn or grass produced with synthetic fertilizers.
This is also why "organic sustainable farming" right now is mostly a scam. It totally depends on synthetic fertilizers that
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Re: Someone should tell them (Score:2)
Which is why letting the cows wander around on grass improving pasture and sequestering carbon is a more use way of operating.
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Cow's milk is already made exclusively from plants.
You're talking about an organic liquid that comes from one of the largest sources of red meat on the planet.
I mean, you could try and convince a vegan of your argument. Just be ready to duck and take cover before their head explodes.
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You're talking about an organic liquid that comes from one of the largest sources of red meat on the planet.
Nope. Milk cows aren't usually eaten.
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You're talking about an organic liquid that comes from one of the largest sources of red meat on the planet.
Nope. Milk cows aren't usually eaten.
Ah. That must explain why vegans happily consume cows milk. I see by my own error, the logic among that group, goes even deeper that I had previously imagined.
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It's gonna blow your mind when you realize what happens to 99.999% of male roaster chickens.
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It's gonna blow your mind when you realize what happens to 99.999% of male roaster chickens.
Can't imagine with a name like "roasters", but let me guess; the same thing that happens to broilers and fryers? They become food that vegans still won't eat?
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No, it's far worse. They are culled.
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fyi, milk products are NOT vegan
Re: Someone should tell them (Score:2)
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fyi, milk products are NOT vegan
Yes, and sarcastic comments are NOT meant to be taken seriously. Much like vegan food rules.
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And... that is why snark or sarcasm tags are used... for other gentle readers to get the drift ;)
But yeah, they guy you were replying to was a moron, to think that meat producers would allow one scrap of potential profit to get away from them is just fanciful
Dairy cows (elderly) are also a potential source for BSE to get into the human food chain since they frequently are presented as "downer" cows to meat processing plants
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Things are changing though. https://www.thecattlesite.com/... [thecattlesite.com]
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Nope. Milk cows aren't usually eaten.
Yes they are. Nearly 100% of dairy cattle are eventually eaten.
Do you really believe there are retirement homes for retired cows? With green pastures and daily massages as a reward for their lifetime of milk production?
When you see a packet of ground beef in the grocery store, it is occasionally from a retired milker.
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Yep. I should have qualified that: "Not usually eaten by humans".
They're old and stringy and there's not much meat on them because their bodies just spent years doing nothing but make milk.
I'm sure they're not going to throw them away though, not with dog food so expensive.
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> Nope. Milk cows aren't usually eaten.
The average dairy cow is only part of the herd for 5 years before it's culled. Do you suppose farmers just let it loose to roam the countryside, or do you suppose they try to extract as much value as they can by butchering it?
=Smidge=
Re:Someone should tell them (Score:4, Informative)
well, you don't eat a steak from a milk cow anyway (I've done it, pretty tough), but that isn't to say they go to waste. Milks cows don't live long lives no matter what, about 7 years before old age kicks in. Once that hits, often they are turned into hamburger for fast food burger joints.
Source: me, grew up on a dairy, most of my family are still in the dairy industry.
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Cow's milk also requires a cow
Citation needed.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Vegan Cowboys launched this a few months ago? (Score:2)
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No one is going to make a production ready microbe for milk proteins and give it away for 2.5 Million, it's a lot of money and yet not nearly enough.
It's kind of a sign of weakness, they have the lab and the specialists ... and they can't figure it out.
Oatmilk (Score:5, Interesting)
A good quality oatmilk works fine for baking, iced coffee, cereal, etc. It has a flavor and consistency approximating skim milk. It doesn't provoke nut allergies. And can be produced gluten free. (some cross contamination is typical with oats as they can be processed on the same equipment as wheat and barley). It doesn't make very good cheese or vegan butter, but with the right culture it does make a passable yogurt. Perhaps the best aspect of oatmilk is that it can be incredibly cheap to produce. Pennies on the dollar compared to almond milk.
P.S. I drink real milk whenever I can, but I cook for someone who is allergic. I have zero issues with lactose even in my old age. While I have a great deal of understanding of how the dairy industry works in the US, and how it could be improved), I still do not have any ethnical issues with consuming animal products. Others are free to make a different choice than I have.
Not for coffee (Score:4, Informative)
The point of having milk in coffee is because cow's milk is a buffer solution [wikipedia.org] which neutralises the acids in coffee.
In other words, it makes coffee taste better.
Oatmilk does not have that property. Instead it could add an acidic sweet tang, making the coffee taste even worse than without..
Oatmilk (and other oat-based dairy substitutes) contain gluten from the oat, and often also emulsifiers. The dominant brand where I live has palm oil in its products, and is owned part by the Chinese government and Blackstone -- of which neither should get my money.
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I love milk, and am fortunate that I don't have any problems drinking it. But my wife and daughter don't tolerate it... so we generally have substitutes around.
All that is to say - I've tried most of the common alternatives, and oat milk is the only one I find good enough to use as a beverage.
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Some of the brands are really cheap and taste like starchy water. I would recommend Chobani over Planet Oat, and that over Silk Oat Yeah. And generally making it yourself ends up better than store bought. This is also true of soy milk, the store bought stuff is horrid tasting and has slimy thickeners in it. Ideally everyone should go to a Vietnamese in the morning and try some proper soy milk to get a sense of where to set expectations.
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Vietnamese bakery*
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Your correction came too late - I already got slapped by a Vietnamese woman.
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You couldn't at least wait until morning could you?
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Its like skim milk he says
It doesnt make milk or cheese he says
Under perfect conditions, yogurt is only passable he says.
Lets put this goal post right here next to Gluten Free, Peanut Allergies,
But it works fine for baking, eh? with nothing in it that approximates the fat/cream content desired since it is approximating skim, yes? You wont be able to find sense in what he says because he is really trying to convin
Impossible Milk (Score:4, Informative)
PART 131 -- MILK AND CREAM
Subpart B--Requirements for Specific Standardized Milk and Cream
Sec. 131.110 Milk.
(a) Description. Milk is the lacteal secretion, practically free from colostrum, obtained by the complete milking of one or more healthy cows. Milk that is in final package form for beverage use shall have been pasteurized or ultrapasteurized, and shall contain not less than 8 1/4 percent milk solids not fat and not less than 3 1/4 percent milkfat. Milk may have been adjusted by separating part of the milkfat therefrom, or by adding thereto cream, concentrated milk, dry whole milk, skim milk, concentrated skim milk, or nonfat dry milk. Milk may be homogenized.
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That definition doesn't even account for Goat Milk and Sheep Milk.
Thankfully, that particular code does not try to regulate how the public can use the word. Right now, you can walk into any supermarket and find Goat Milk, Sheep Milk, Coconut Milk, etc.
The dairy industry would love to convince the FDA to regulate the word "milk." But so far, they have not been successful. If the FDA were to adopt such a regulation, it would face a challenge on first amendment grounds, which would need to be resolved in co
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Of course not, that's why they can't call goat milk just plain milk and confuse consumers.
These laws and definitions were put in place to make sure consumers weren't being cheated by unethical manufacturers (for example adding water to milk to improve profit). These federal requirements establish standards for what words mean so everyone knows what they are getting.
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The dairy lobby has been losing their asses handily on all this milk labeling bullshit they have been trying to gin up again recently. One of their fairly recent gaffes was when they brought an argument against a small dairy for their labeling of "skim milk" that had not been fortified with Vitamin A. There is no cream in skim milk, and the Vitamin A in milk is all in the cream. Though I have no idea how they were able to do the mental gymnastics to make the argument that the literal definition of milk did
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The liquid from coconuts has been called "milk" for centuries.
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I would think that even just using "milk" in the name will raise big problems with the FDA in ways that "burger" didn't. They'll probably call it something like "mylk".
Malk! Now with vitamin R. [duckduckgo.com]
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I would think that even just using "milk" in the name will raise big problems with the FDA [...]
I'm not sure why you'd think that Impossible using the term would suddenly cause problems, given the ready availability of soy milk, almond milk, and coconut milk (and rice milk, oat milk, hemp milk, sunflower seed milk, etc. etc. etc....) in grocery stores across the US. The summary even mentioned them in the first line. Plant-based milks have been on store shelves in the US and marketed as "milk" for at least the last several decades. Impossible coming to market with their own take on the niche is a welco
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If Impossible decided to refer to their product as just "Milk", I suspect it would indeed cause confusion and could get them in hot water, but their marketing up to this point has always avoided problems such as those, so I don't think we have any reason to suspect they would alter course here.
It's also worth noting that the use of a descriptor is a matter of social convention. Head to a different part of the globe and you'll need to specify "cow's" if you don't want to end up with yak's or camel's milk whe
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I have not come across a problem where a plant-based "milk" is passed off as milk from a cow. As far as I know, plant-based milk substitutes are still much more expensive than cow's milk, so the likelihood of any kind of fraud due to labeling is pretty remote.
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I have not come across a problem where a plant-based "milk" is passed off as milk from a cow.
Likewise, hence why this didn't come across as something that would cause any new concerns.
As far as I know, plant-based milk substitutes are still much more expensive than cow's milk
Prices have come down in recent years, but yeah, they're still a bit higher. At my local grocery store, right now, a half gallon of almond milk will run you $3, which looks to be roughly equal to the organic cow's milk choices, but about $1 more expensive than the store brand cow's milk.
Viable Alternative (Score:2)
"I don't understand. Everybody likes rats. Why wouldn't they want to drink the rats' milk?"
Re:Viable Alternative (Score:4, Informative)
What about dog's milk [youtube.com]?
"Nothing wrong with dog's milk. Full of goodness, full of vitamins, full of marrowbone jelly. Lasts longer than any other type of milk, dog's milk, (since) no bugger'll drink it. Plus, of course, the advantage of dog's milk is that when it goes off it takes exactly the same as when it's fresh."
That's impossible! Even for a computer. (Score:2)
If you can't get at with a rope, a pointy stick (Score:2)
I see this stuff in the grocery stores and it just looks like the bottom of the uncanny valley.
Mother's milk (Score:3)
Why would you mimic cow's milk when it's just a poor substitute for our mother's milk?
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Why would you mimic cow's milk when it's just a poor substitute for our mother's milk?
I am in my sixties. Mother's milk is not an option.
better than most meat substitutes (Score:3)
My #1 favorite food is hamburgers, but I can not eat them because I have alpha-gal allergy [wikipedia.org]. If you have dietary restrictions which prevent you from eating beef, then the Impossible Burger is worthwhile. I've been trying meat substitutes for decades and they all taste like cardboard except the impossible burger. Though it does have a soy aftertaste and is far more expensive than real beef, so eat the real thing if you can.
Looking forward to the milk substitute for the same reasons.
Good (Score:2)
Because the stuff made with soy and almond does not taste like cow milk.
They still need to work on their beef. (Score:2)
Impossible beef, really doesn't taste like the meat it suppose to taste like.
It does taste kinda like a meat, but not beef.
I don't dislike the taste of Impossible Burgers and their competitors. But I like them for what they are, a better veggie burger, which I enjoy from time to time. But by no means will it fill my want for a hamburger.
It seems that their claims are from Vegans who had not eaten meat in 20 years and forgot how it tasted like.
or perhaps Vegans tate real meat like that, and non-vegans don't.
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In what univerae.is horribly.processed-to-death-and-beyond junk food "better"?
What about cheese and ice cream? (Score:2)
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Can they possibly pick a more gay name?
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How many consumers buy milk in the grocery store and then use it to make their own cheese? I suspect that this is an infinitesimal market.
You can dump almost any sweetened liquid into an ice cream machine and get a decent dessert. You can make sorbet from fruit juice or sherbert from a mixture of juice and coconut milk.
Dragons Milk is taken and that stuff is pricey (Score:2)
Dragons Milk is taken and that stuff is pricey vs other beers.
Indeed (Score:2, Funny)
" those who enjoy the experience of consuming animal-sourced dairy products,"
Yes, secretions of such an animal gland must be delicious, for a calf.
Silk soy milk is already pretty close.. (Score:2)
It sure seems like Silk does a pretty good job of getting soy milk close to milk - I've not had any issues mixing it with drinks, hot or cold.
Still, I'll give whatever they come up with a shot and I wish them luck in getting something fairly creamy tasting.
Why not fake human milk? (Score:3)
Re: Why not fake human milk? (Score:3)
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That makes sense. I drink cows milk and I have rockin' calves.
Not so great for my ass tho
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Plus, cow's milk makes me toot
I am not a doctor, but I have read about this. I believe it is a mild form of lactose intolerance. Basically, the lactose in the milk is not digested, and passes through to the large intestine, where it feeds gut bacteria that produce methane, hence the toots. The ability for adult humans to digest milk is an unusual trait among mammals, and may only be a few thousand years old. I believe lactose intolerance is common in East Asian and African people.
While we are on the subject of toot-producing foods, bean
Yet, milk from a cow... (Score:2)
Will be better for you, presuming you are not actually allergic.
Actually allergic meaning something a whole lot more than... I do not like the taste, therefore I must be allergic.
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Will be better for you, presuming you are not actually allergic.
Actually allergic meaning something a whole lot more than... I do not like the taste, therefore I must be allergic.
I think people have to understand the difference between a food intolerance, and an allergy. An engineer that I worked with is gluten intolerant. If he eats wheat products, he gets uncomfortable bloating and other digestive effects, so naturally, he avoids foods that might contain wheat proteins. An actual allergy can be much more dangerous, where a tiny trace of the allergen causes effects like anaphylactic shock, as if the person had ingested a deadly poison.
delish and nutrish (Score:2)
my favorite way to wash down a fakemeat burger is with a big tall glass of Malk.... now with Vitamin R!
I've tried most of the alternatives (Score:2)
Expect it to be like their other products (Score:2)
Absurd (Score:3)
Its absurd .
We have several Plant based milks already.
Soya Milk
Almond Milk
Oat Milk
Coconut Milk
For example.
Re:Are they good for you? (Score:4, Interesting)
The problem isn't that they aren't "good for you", it's that they aren't good sources of protein. Most of them supply healthy calories, and many of them supply some calcium, but read the labels carefully.
For me the lack of protein is the problem...or was back when I was considering them. Even the soy milks are/were really low in protein.
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I'd be glad to use a plant-based creamer in my coffee; that is, if they could make one that was even remotely suitable.
Try coconut milk. It is creamy and has a pleasant taste.
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One of the problems with reproducing an animal milk is that we don't fully understand how it does what it does -- grow a baby animal into a more mature animal quickly, safely and effectively.
It isn't like a milk is just a simple mixture of a macronutrients: take so much water, saturated fat, protein and sugars etc. You can mix molecules in those broad categories together and if you choose well you might come up with something that's a fair sensory imitation of milk, but there's no guarantee it will functio
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Look up Fatty15, a fatty acid that can act as an anti-aging nutrient [fatty15.com]
Humans figured this out from in depth DNA and protein analysis, what other mysteries await in humble cow's milk?
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Speaking as a vegetarian, I am not keen on highly processed vegetable foods that attempt to imitate meat or dairy products. Let beans be beans, I say. The one highly processed vegetable food I regularly use is dried soya mince. The fact is, soybeans just do not taste very nice, hence traditional products such as tofu, which can absorb flavours to be more tasty.
I read somewhere that some vegetarian milk substitutes actually require more agricultural resources than rearing and milking cows. In traditional agr
Re: Cereal (Score:2)