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I'm trying to take the plunge and go vegetarian and mostly vegan if possible. I want to cut out dairy from my diet but I love milk. I have it with cereal but mostly in my coffee. I love ice coffee with milk in it and drink it every day when I come home from work. I recently bought Silk Almond milk unsweetened and am not very impressed. It's barely tolerable to me but I'm trying it for a few days to see if I can get used to it. Is there anything else out there that might taste more like real milk? I heard rice milk is watery and sweet so I know I wouldn't like that. How about coconut milk in the dairy section next to the almond milk? I was tempted to try that as well.
Powdered non dairy creamers seem to be filled with all kinds of chemicals. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. BTW, my milk consumption is about a gallon a week of regular milk.
Almond milk is the worst, IMO. Very watery.
Rice milk is a bit creamier than almond milk, but it's delicious to me. I drink it every day in my thai tea in place of condensed milk, and I swear it tastes exactly like restaurant thai tea. It's awesome.
You can get unsweetened versions of any kind of milk.
Now if you want really creamy and smooth, go for hemp, hazelnut, or cashew milk. Unsweetened.
.... that pea milk is another newer plant milk on the market. It is comparable to soy milk as far as more protein, and is a little thicker and richer than a lot of plant milks. Ripple is a brand that sells pea milk. It doesn't sound that good, but is actually quite tasty! They also add vegan DHA to it, and I think B12? I used it once to make mashed potatoes and have used it in baking and it works very well due to the higher protein content and richness of it. It is higher in calories though than other plant milks. They have an unsweetened version that is 80 calories per cup. It is one of the more expensive plant milks though, and can be hard to find. ....
Ms. Robin, I was wondering if you taste pea? And is it the green garden pea it is extracted from, or another, more bland type of pea? Peas are my favorite vegetable of all, but I don't know if I'd like to taste it as a drink?
Quote:
(from a post of Ms. Guinea Pig)...
Soak a cup of almonds almonds overnight. The next day, drain, rinse, and blend with whatever ratio of water you like. I like mine thicker than most, but the standard is 1:4 or 1:3. Strain. I use the reusable produce bags, but it would probably be really easy to make your own, or buy a nut milk bag. I add a pinch of salt and a little raw honey to mine. Just enough to give it more depth and complexity, the way real milk has nuanced flavors.
I find the almond milk lasts longer with salt and honey, too. I keep it in an airtight pitcher and it lasts a week.
Cashews are really good too, and the soaking part takes only a few hours.
I'm picky, so I like to slip the skins off the almonds before I blend them, it adds an extra 5 minutes but it's meditative for me and I like it! I don't think this is necessary. ...
Thank you for the recipe and thoughts on this. I think I'll try this. I love the nut milks, and would like to give a home made one a whirl around in the blender
[quote=TerraDown;49771782]Ms. Robin, I was wondering if you taste pea? And is it the green garden pea it is extracted from, or another, more bland type of pea? Peas are my favorite vegetable of all, but I don't know if I'd like to taste it as a drink?
There is just a very very slight hint of a pea taste, but very subtle. They use "yellow peas" (quoted from their website https://www.ripplefoods.com/faqs/ ). I am assuming by yellow peas they mean yellow lentils or split peas. It is sort of like hummus, where you start with chickpeas and add tahini, sesame oil, cumin, lemon juice, and a pinch of salt and by the time you blend all that you don't taste the chickpeas at all. This milk blends the peas with a sweetener, oil, and other ingredients so the finished product doesn't taste like peas. It is probably the thickest of the plant milks I have tried, and the least sweet. It's been a little while since I had any, but I recall that it is slightly bland unless you buy the full fat or chocolate version. It's not bad at all. The blandness of it makes it suitable for baking/cooking. I was hesitant at first too as pea milk doesn't sound that appetizing lol. But I guess it doesn't sound that much worse than soy milk, and like soy milk is made of beans/peas. I don't taste the "soybean" in soy milk either, and in fact soy milk is my favorite of the plant milks, but unfortunately my thyroid issues don't take too well to drinking it regularly as it makes my thyroid meds less absorbable. So it's a "treat" I consume once in a great while. Pea milk, almond milk, coconut milk, cashew milk, rice milk, flaxseed milk do not have this issue for me. If you still aren't sure, they also sell single serve pea milks (Ripple brand) at Target stores in the refrigerated section. Walmart might have them too but I'm not sure. That's what I did the first time, tried a single serve instead of buying a huge container.
I have yet to find any plant-based milk that tastes anything similar to cow's milk. Personally I prefer rice milk for cereal, with coconut milk being second choice. But you're really just going to have to experiment until you find something that tastes acceptable to you.
Heads up: if you're looking to avoid excess chemicals and preservatives, even a lot of plant milks are full of "colorful" ingredients.
My guess is that a lot of plant milks have ingredients such as guar gum, locust bean gum, soy or sunflower lecithin, gellan gum,cane sugar, xantham gum etc. Most of these are thickeners of some sort. Many plant milks are fortified with calcium triphosphate or carbonate which some whole foods proponents think are "unnatural" sources of calcium, and most plant milks are fortified with vitamin D2 (ergocalciferol) which is a plant based form of vitamin D. Some people argue that D2 is inferior to D3 (cholecalciferol) for humans because it has to be converted naturally in the body to D3 in order to be utilized by the body.
There are plant milks without these ingredients but they can be hard to find. One can make their own plant milk without all these ingredients, but if you rely on plant milk as a source of calcium or protein, you need to be mindful of this when making your own. My homemade almond or flaxseed milk tends to be much thicker and less watered down than store bought and has far more calories, but less calcium unless I add a calcium powder and liquid D drops to it. Almonds are a natural source of calcium but it requires quite a few of them to be of significant value for calcium. Because I don't add a thickener or emulsifier, I need to shake it well each time too. I used to make my own more often, but with my busy lifestyle I now buy store bought for the most part. I am not too bothered by the ingredients above, but I know others who have allergies and intolerances to them.
My guess is that a lot of plant milks have ingredients such as guar gum, locust bean gum, soy or sunflower lecithin, gellan gum,cane sugar, xantham gum etc. Most of these are thickeners of some sort. Many plant milks are fortified with calcium triphosphate or carbonate which some whole foods proponents think are "unnatural" sources of calcium, and most plant milks are fortified with vitamin D2 (ergocalciferol) which is a plant based form of vitamin D. Some people argue that D2 is inferior to D3 (cholecalciferol) for humans because it has to be converted naturally in the body to D3 in order to be utilized by the body.
There are plant milks without these ingredients but they can be hard to find. One can make their own plant milk without all these ingredients, but if you rely on plant milk as a source of calcium or protein, you need to be mindful of this when making your own. My homemade almond or flaxseed milk tends to be much thicker and less watered down than store bought and has far more calories, but less calcium unless I add a calcium powder and liquid D drops to it. Almonds are a natural source of calcium but it requires quite a few of them to be of significant value for calcium. Because I don't add a thickener or emulsifier, I need to shake it well each time too. I used to make my own more often, but with my busy lifestyle I now buy store bought for the most part. I am not too bothered by the ingredients above, but I know others who have allergies and intolerances to them.
Well, all you have to do to find out for sure is read the label. Or just make your own.
It seems that most of the plant-based "milks" now have gellan gum in them. I have learned that gellan gum causes certain socially unacceptable GI issues for me. And to address the problem I am taking probiotics.
If you read about gellan gum, it sounds like a microbial slurry used as a thickening agent. From what I read online, there is an study regarding the safety of gellan gum that dates back to 1990 that involved 10 men and 10 women.
Wikipedia says gellan gum is "a water-soluble anionic polysaccharide produced by the bacterium Sphingomonas elodea." Gellan Gum is produced by fermenting a pure culture of Sphingomonas elodea. You can do a Google search for the company, CP Kelco which identifies itself as the leading global producer of gellan gum to read more about this product.
When I come across Malk, I will try it since it has none of these "colorful ingredients."
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