Milk is quite a popular and nutritious product. So common that many myths have appeared around him, which we will try to dispel. Most consider milk a useful product. Is it really? Let’s find out from this article called types of milk and its beneficial properties.
Milk contains substances with unique properties. Any of these substances will have a good effect on the body. It should be noted that milk by itself may not always be a healthy product. For example, if there is a disease of the gastrointestinal tract, drinking milk is recommended. And if lactose intolerance is observed, then in this case it is recommended to use only fermented milk products with bifidobacteria or fermented milk, where there is no lactose.

Today there are various directions in dairy production. This is a release of special nutrition for people with various diseases and the elderly, athletes and those belonging to different social groups, children, etc. Milk can be specially enriched with trace elements and vitamins. The uniqueness of milk lies in its properties, both in general and its individual components. In addition, it is a biological fluid (the only one) that a person can drink throughout his life. Today, various components and fractions of milk are successfully used in medicine.
The composition of milk includes a lot of water about 87% and their dry matter is about 13%. If we dwell on dry substances, then their composition is quite diverse. We can say that milk is a multifactorial and multicomponent liquid. For example, there are over 140 fatty acids in milk fat. And each such substance is useful in its own way. Listing their properties and benefits, you get a whole encyclopedia.

Is there any benefit from the milk that is sold in supermarkets? Yes. Many people simply forgot that the benefits of the product are not only vitamins. These are carbohydrates, and fats, and proteins. All of them are in the composition of milk and are stored in it. It is clear that there are no vitamins in sterilized milk, but they are all preserved in pasteurized milk. In all other respects, these two types of milk have the same properties.
What is the difference between the properties of pasteurized and sterilized milk? If we talk about sterilized milk, then it should be said that UHT milk is essentially the same product. So that’s the difference in production technology. The stages of preparation of raw materials for any dairy products are the same. We only note the different temperatures at which these processes occur. Pasteurization requires temperatures up to 99C, but sterilizations around 120C and methods for bottling the final product are also different.

Another difference lies in the fact that stabilizers are added to sterilized milk during the production process. Usually these are phosphate or citrate salts. They are found in milk in their natural form, that is, in an inactive state. Why are they added to milk? Their additional quantity guarantees that the product will not turn sour within 7-8 months. Their job is to control acidity. There is such a thing as “emptiness”, so if this void is occupied by acid, the product will turn sour so that this does not happen, the stabilizer salts added forcibly occupy this “emptiness” in this way, preventing the penetration of acid there.
Sterilization is always carried out under sterile conditions. The filling of the product is carried out in completely closed installations, while pasteurized milk can also be filled in an open installation. Note that packaging for sterile milk should not let water, microbes, air, light through, complete sealing. The product is completely disinfected during this process. That ensures the safety of the product for quite a long time.

There is a myth that antibiotics can be added to milk during sterilization. But it’s not. They could be in pasteurized milk, but today, according to GOST, the use of antibiotics in any kind of milk is strictly prohibited, therefore it is strictly controlled.
What is the difference between raw milk and reconstituted milk? Clearly, raw milk has it all. Both bad and good. These are two completely different products. But if you take liquid drinking milk and reconstituted milk, then no one, neither a specialist, nor a laboratory analysis, and even less a buyer, can distinguish them by taste and chemical characteristics. The content of enzymes and vitamins is absent both in reconstituted and drinking milk. The fact is that enzymes provoke spoilage of the product, therefore the temperature regime of processing is chosen in such a way as to inactivate the enzymes. And vitamins are destroyed by themselves during the processing of milk.

Another myth relates to skim milk. They say that it does not make sense to drink it, it has very little calcium and is generally not useful. The fact is that skimmed milk is a product in which the fat content is lowered. Calcium is found in proteins, not fats. Therefore, the amount of calcium in milk does not depend on the amount of fat.
New milk. It is useful only for the first 2 hours after milking, after which lysozyme is inactivated, which protected the product from spoilage and the development of microflora. So after about 2 hours, bacteria will begin to multiply rapidly. Therefore, when buying milk in the markets, there is no guarantee that it is not fresh and it is not possible to check it. In such cases, it must be boiled. It is believed that allergy to cow’s milk is more common than to goat’s milk. Yes it is. This is due to the composition of the protein in the milk of these animals.