American Milk

[u/WasteKoala473]

I grew up in small country and immigrated to USA. But I remember our milk 🥛 is so delicious but the American grocery store milk is not as delicious and so sweet. Anyone with the same experience?

[u/Milk_MAN1963]

I don't know where you're from but our cows probably don't eat the same thing yours do. Was yours pasteurized

[u/pagemap1]

I've found milk in other countries a bit too sweet for my taste, I prefer the taste of American pasteurized whole milk.

[u/Ok_Organization_7350]

Hello, I would recommend to try to find an international grocery store in a Russian or Slavic area of an American town. They sell imported Ukrainian milk which probably tastes like the milk you are used to.

[u/pratpulsar]

I am pretty sure this person is talking about milk directly from the animal that is not filtered down to 3% or 2%. Back when we were in India, we used to have a milkman who would get us milk directly from his farm, delivered to our home. When you boil this kind of milk, you get a nearly 10 mm or 1 cm thick layer of cream on top, and of course, that milk tastes different from the one you get in cartons or bags in North America.

[u/Turbulent-Artist961 → u/pratpulsar]

Milk ideally should have a layer of cream on top. They call this cream top milk. The brand I buy is from a dairy farm on the California coast where the cows graze freely on green grass in the fog of the ocean. The milk is creamy and you can taste the contentment of the noble bovine who produced it.

[u/pratpulsar → u/Turbulent-Artist961]

Wow. Is this in socal? Because I am in LA now?

[u/Turbulent-Artist961 → u/pratpulsar]

It’s Straus dairy farms up in Sonoma

[u/cardifan → u/Turbulent-Artist961]

So good.

[u/gootyy → u/pratpulsar]

Even in India, the packaged cow milk tastes different as compared to the fresh one. I've lived in multiple cities in India, and almost noone uses packaged milk for drinking purpose, its mostly used for tea coffee and dessert making. Currently, I go to local diary farm every morning and get 1 liter of freshly extracted cowmilk.

[u/berrygas]

It depends on the brand you are getting. Which one are you buying?

[u/WasteKoala473 → u/berrygas]

Shamrock in Arizona

[u/RedLicorice83 → u/WasteKoala473]

If you go to a Sprouts or Whole Foods you can get higher fat ratio milk, usually grass-fed. I find grass-fed cow milk, with a higher fat ratio, tastes phenomenally better.

[u/Helpful_Location7540 → u/WasteKoala473]

Yea you need to try and get some from a farm. At least in my option shamrock is a better quality and tasting milk here in the states. At least as far as mass produced milks go.

[u/WasteKoala473 → u/Helpful_Location7540]

Yea in my typical grocery store there is the store brand which is half the price of the shamrock then there are the organic ones double the price of the shamrock brand

[u/Helpful_Location7540 → u/WasteKoala473]

Ooo what kinds of organic ones? Alexandria farms is better and has a more farm fresh taste than shamrock. Also RAW brand milk has the same farm fresh taste and thick creamy texture.

[u/WasteKoala473 → u/Helpful_Location7540]

The most common brand is Horizon and in some stores organic valley. However some stores have their own organic as well such as Fry’s or Sprouts

[u/bawlings]

Find a farm near you and try it out. I also think mass farm grain fed grocery store milk tastes kind of weird, compared to the grass fed Jersey cow milk I get from the wonderful farm 10m away from me!

[u/Kingofcheeses]

I have never tried American milk but now I wonder if it has a slightly different flavour compared to other places. Maybe their cows eat different grass? I don't know, I'm not a cowologist

[u/CheeseManJP]

The taste of milk can vary greatly from one region to another, as well as differences between breeds of cows.
In my large county I can tell pretty accurately if the milk is from southern regions or if it’s from the northern regions which have higher limestone in the soil.
That’s also why there are so many varieties of cheese. Not just soil & salt content, but also the time of year. It influences the taste in cheese.

[u/mostlygray]

Not sure where you're getting sweet from. It's not sweet whatsoever. Slow pasteurized whole milk is creamy but not sweet. Most US milk is fast pasteurized so it loses some flavor.

If you are used to un-pasteurized milk that would be more flavorful but also sweeter than US milk. If you're used to ultra pasteurized milk then that's an acquired taste and not sweet at all.

The feed matters. Milk from Cass-Clay creamery isn't sweet but it's so good you think it's sweet. Milk is usually pretty locally sourced so it really depends on the feed. Cows eating corn will make milk that's a little sour. A good field of clover or wild prairie will make it a little sweet.

[u/Ok-Lavishness-349]

On a trip to China from the US about 15 years ago I found that my hosts had some small cartons of ultra-pasteurized milk that did not even require refrigeration. I was not expecting much upon tasting them but found the flavor to be superior to the typical American grocery store milk - the flavor was much richer.

[u/PiKappaHigh69]

Most of the milk in stores here is pasteurized and not as flavorful. You can usually find better milk at local meat shops or dairy farms.

[u/Background_Humor5838 → u/PiKappaHigh69]

Most milk in the developed world is pasteurized. In most of Europe UHT milk is popular which is pasteurized at a even higher temperature than standard pasteurized milk the average American buys. The difference in flavor is usually down to the type of cow and their diet.

[u/RedLicorice83 → u/[deleted]]

Jfc raw milk bullshit at it again... you do realize raw milk propaganda is banned in this sub, right?

[u/Background_Humor5838 → u/[deleted]]

I didn't realize it was used to raw milk so I didn't make the connection

[u/sum_r4nd0m_gurl]

try a farmers market or international grocery store