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The rise of alternative milks

theguardian.com

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Re: The rise of alternative milks

#121

Post by dashundchen »

Pharmakon wrote: post #100
dashundchen wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Soy milk has protein and doesn't necessarily have sugar depending on the brand, if you are looking for a response to that. And if we want to talk water usage and environmental impact, any cattle/dairy product is consuming at least order of magnitude more resources and emissions than oats or soy beans.

Soy milk has protein and doesn't necessarily have sugar depending on the brand, if you are looking for a response to that. And if we want to talk water usage and environmental impact, any cattle/dairy product is consuming at least order of magnitude more resources and emissions than oats or soy beans. Oat milk isn’t even a rounding error of total plant “milk” consumption. https://www.statista.com/statistics/693015/da…

And? I'm not sure what your point is. I was pointing out there are non-dairy milks with protein in them.

Almond milk still uses less water and way less CO2e emissions than dairy to produce the same volume of milk.

Animal agriculture is horrendous for the planet, any increase in non-dairy milk at the expense of dairy milk is a definite win for the environment.

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46459714

From the BBC calculator, which comes from University of Oxford researcher Joseph Poore, and Thomas Nemecek of the Agroecology and Environment Research Division in Zurich, Switzerland

1 glass (200ml) per serving almond milk daily

Over an entire year your consumption of almond milk is contributing 51kg to your annual greenhouse gas emissions. ... 27,042 litres of water

1 glass (200ml) per serving dairy milk daily

Over an entire year your consumption of dairy milk is contributing 229kg to your annual greenhouse gas emissions ... 45,733 litres of water 652m² land

Re: The rise of alternative milks

#122

Post by JacobJans »

jelliclesfarm wrote: post #113

If someone is looking to switch for sustainablity reasons, they shouldn’t be buying liquid non dairy almond either. You must need a handful of almonds to make your own almond milk. It’s wasteful in so many ways..from processing to transporting to the water content and all the middle men charges in the supply chain. Soak almonds. Peel. Purée with water..strain. Or don’t. Fresh almond milk. I realize many people won’t…

Store bought almond milk also has additives that may not be good for you. Emulsifiers, thickeners, starches, preservatives, etc. For people with sensitive digestion, it may be safer to make it at home.

Re: The rise of alternative milks

#123

Post by justin66 »

jelliclesfarm wrote: post #113

If someone is looking to switch for sustainablity reasons, they shouldn’t be buying liquid non dairy almond either. You must need a handful of almonds to make your own almond milk. It’s wasteful in so many ways..from processing to transporting to the water content and all the middle men charges in the supply chain. Soak almonds. Peel. Purée with water..strain. Or don’t. Fresh almond milk. I realize many people won’t…

I'm told making oat milk is similarly simple. That one is tempting because the ingredients are so cheap.

Re: The rise of alternative milks

#124

Post by williamdclt »

sridca wrote: post #96
rebuilder wrote: post #61

I was meeting a client yesterday at their office, they offered me coffee and asked me if I wanted milk, then whether I'd like oat or regular. I said regular (usually drink oat but was somehow preoccupied) and the response was "yea, fortunately that's still available". To me that was a pretty striking example of how the realities of what climage change is going to push us towards are sinking in.

What has climate change got to do with cow's milk?

You need lots of cows for cow's milk. You need lots of food and water for cows. You need lots of plants for cow's food. You need lots of water, pesticides, energy for plants.

Plus: production of greenhouse gas, water pollution

Re: The rise of alternative milks

#125

Post by sgarman »

YokoZar wrote: post #111
lprubin wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve seen it estimated that it takes 2,000 gallons of water to produce a gallon of cow milk which would be twice what it takes to produce almond milk.

Some quick googling suggests there are 4 cups of almonds in a gallon of almond milk, and ~25 almonds per cup, so about 100 gallons of water per gallon of almond milk from just growing the almonds. That's a factor of 20x, if we believe it takes 2000 gallons of water to make a gallon of milk. But another source on the top links of Google says it takes about 4 gallons of water to make a gallon of milk. This is a differe…

I mean at a minimum that lower number not taking into account the water needed to feed the cow, grow the cows food etc. I'm sure almonds is a lot of water but there is no way it's close to a dairy cow.

Re: The rise of alternative milks

#126

Post by williamdclt »

mnm1 wrote: post #118
dashundchen wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know what region you are in, but in the US almost any store that stocks non-dairy milks will sell sweetened and unsweetened. Though I agree with disliking the sweetened stuff. I'm not sure who the market for the sweetened stuff is for - coffee creamer maybe, or trying to simulate milk lactose? but the unsweetened works just as well in any scenario. Additionally, nut and oat milks are very easy and cheap to ma…

Yeah but the problem with unsweetened soy and almond milk (and even slightly sweetened) is that it's fucking disgusting so it has no use for me and for anyone that feels that way. I highly doubt any of the other veggie milks here are less disgusting. I would guess that lactose free milk is also disgusting before they add sugar back in but can't prove it.

> fucking disgusting so it has no use for me and for anyone that feels that way

That's a completely different argument from your original one. And you could apply it to any food, a lot of people find cow milk "fucking disgusting", there's no point arguing on subjective taste

Re: The rise of alternative milks

#127

Post by ggm »

pofilat wrote: post #106
ggm wrote: post #90

I personally wish the same stringent law of domain d'origine was applied here. We can't call Australian sparkling wine made on Pinot noir grapes champagne. If it didn't come out of a cow, sheep, goat, or in the case of "red dwarf" dog teat, I don't think it should be called milk or even mylk. Partner of a nut anaphylaxis sufferer, parent of a formerly cow milk intolerant child so I've straddled both sides of what peo…

Right. If it comes from a cow or a goat, call it cow's milk, or goat's milk, not ambiguous "milk"

Fair call.

Re: The rise of alternative milks

#128

Post by Pharmakon »

dashundchen wrote: post #121
Pharmakon wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Soy milk has protein and doesn't necessarily have sugar depending on the brand, if you are looking for a response to that. And if we want to talk water usage and environmental impact, any cattle/dairy product is consuming at least order of magnitude more resources and emissions than oats or soy beans. Oat milk isn’t even a rounding error of total plant “milk” consumption. https://www.statista.com/statistics/693015/da…

And? I'm not sure what your point is. I was pointing out there are non-dairy milks with protein in them. Almond milk still uses less water and way less CO2e emissions than dairy to produce the same volume of milk. Animal agriculture is horrendous for the planet, any increase in non-dairy milk at the expense of dairy milk is a definite win for the environment. https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46459714 From…

I can’t tell from that calculation, but it seems they’re comparing X of almonds, to a whole dairy cow. That’s... weird. It’s also odd that they compare by volume, and not by calorie. All I’m all I’m left wanting to see the data behind the calculator so fair comparisons can be made. Either way given that my advice was, and remains “drink water” and not “drink milk” I’m also not sure what your point is.

Especially when looking at the graph on the page you linked to, it becomes clear that the CO2 emission question is spurious. Dairy is fairly efficient, but actually killing and eating the animal isn’t. Fortunately beef cattle are not dairy cattle, and while the industries are linked, they are not inextricably linked. Most of all though, I’ll say it again, All told drinking a lot of anything other than water is probably a bad move... To that I’d add that if your real concern is environmental, milk is the least of it, cheese being a far bigger offender. Cheese being effectively condensed milk means that your kilogram of cheese took 10kg of milk to make.

Re: The rise of alternative milks

#129

Post by ggm »

greglindahl wrote: post #94
ggm wrote: post #90

I personally wish the same stringent law of domain d'origine was applied here. We can't call Australian sparkling wine made on Pinot noir grapes champagne. If it didn't come out of a cow, sheep, goat, or in the case of "red dwarf" dog teat, I don't think it should be called milk or even mylk. Partner of a nut anaphylaxis sufferer, parent of a formerly cow milk intolerant child so I've straddled both sides of what peo…

So, even though "milk" has been used for centuries for almond milk, rice milk, etc, it should suddenly be outlawed? I've got some medieval cookbooks digitized on my webpages, what punishment do you propose for people like me?

I think we should milk this for all its worth.

Re: The rise of alternative milks

#130

Post by bryanlarsen »

YokoZar wrote: post #111
lprubin wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve seen it estimated that it takes 2,000 gallons of water to produce a gallon of cow milk which would be twice what it takes to produce almond milk.

Some quick googling suggests there are 4 cups of almonds in a gallon of almond milk, and ~25 almonds per cup, so about 100 gallons of water per gallon of almond milk from just growing the almonds. That's a factor of 20x, if we believe it takes 2000 gallons of water to make a gallon of milk. But another source on the top links of Google says it takes about 4 gallons of water to make a gallon of milk. This is a differe…

Do you count the rain that grew the grass the cows eat or not? In some water usage calculations they only count unnatural usage, ie irrigation and pumped drinking water.
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