Is raw milk healthier than pasteurized?

Question

Obviously, pasteurization is useful since it reduces organisms in the milk, but how frequent were milk-related illnesses before pasteurization, and what other nutrients and flavours are lost in the process.

If one can get milk from a local source with a quick turnaround, so the milk is not sitting through the packaging/shipping process for a long time, how bad are the dangers?

Asked by Eclipse

Answer

Healthier is a loaded word in this case. The raw milk camp claims a richer flavor, more nutrients, and less allergies. The pasteurized camp claims just as nutritious, with better texture, but safer. Once all the practicalities of producing, distributing, and ensuring the quality of large quantities of milk come into play, the debate becomes fierce. What happens when there are many raw milk producers? If someone reacts badly to raw milk, who is liable? What are the observed health benefits in large population studies?

In the raw milk debate I like the format adopted by the Michigan Fresh Unprocessed Whole Milk Workgroup

Answered by papin

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Is there any reason to scald milk?

Question

I recently found an old family cream pie recipe that called for scalding the milk. Is there any reason to do this other than to kill bacteria? If not, isn't this an unnecessary step if using pasteurized milk?

Asked by chills42

Answer

If you've found a very old recipe that calls for scalding for food safety reasons, then yes, it is probably unnecessary. However, there are places where it is called for.

In particular, when making Béchamel (which is made by combining milk and roux), it is important to scald or at least warm the milk, otherwise you can and most likely will end up with lumps. The reason to actually scald as oppose to simply warming the milk tends to be one of cooking time; the hotter the milk is, the less time you have to spend whisking.

In general, any recipe that calls for milk and needs to thicken tends to benefit from scalding for the latter reason - it just takes less time to thicken that way.

Answered by Aaronut

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what's a good technique for pasteurizing eggs?

Question

I tried to make homemade eggnog last Christmas. It turned out fine, but the eggs were an issue. I thought about buying pasteurized eggs but they would've run me $12 for two dozen, which seemed obscene.

Pasteurization was important because my young child might have wanted some eggnog, so it needed to be very safe.

So I pasteurized the eggs by heating them a little at a time in the microwave, stirring, heating etc until they reached 145F. I may have separated the yolks, but can't remember exactly. I read about the technique on a blog. This worked well enough, but I ended up with some chunks of cooked egg in the egg nog. Not a big deal, but I spent a lot of time on this eggnog and was disappointed that it was less than perfect.

What's a good technique for pasteurizing eggs that doesn't result in chunks and gets the eggs to the correct temperature?

Answer

The microwave is too harsh an environment for this.

Pasteurize them in the shell, in a large pot of water on the stove. You must bring the water up to 140 - 150 F (60 - 65 C) for 3 to 5 minutes to pasteurize them. You must not exceed 150 or you will begin to cook the egg. If the eggs are in the water as you heat it then they will closely match the temperature of the surrounding water. Just make sure they aren't resting on the bottom of the pan. If you want to be extra careful you can leave them in longer, as long as you don't let them get too hot.

Alternatively, you can combine the eggs with the milk and heat this slowly on the stove until it reaches a temperature or 140-150 F, maintaining for 3-5 minutes.

Update

You can also pasteurize in-shell at 135 F (57 C) for for 75 minutes according to this reference: http://amath.colorado.edu/~baldwind/sous-vide.html

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