Dairy product

Dairy products are generally defined as foods produced from cow's or domestic buffalo's milk. They are usually high-energy-yielding food products. A production plant for such processing is called a dairy or a dairy factory. Raw milk for processing comes mainly from cows, and, to a lesser extent, from other mammals such as goats, sheep, yaks, camels, or horses. Dairy products are commonly found in European, Middle Eastern and Indian cuisine, whereas they are almost unknown in East Asian cuisine. The United Kingdom Food Standards Agency defines dairy as "foodstuffs made from mammalian milk".^[1]

Milk products and production relationships

Dairy farm

Types of dairy products

A selection of three common dairy products made by a South African dairy company. A box of full cream long life milk, a bottle of strawberry drinking yogurt, and a carton of passion fruit yogurt.

• Milk after optional homogenization, pasteurization, in several grades after standardization of the fat level, and possible addition of bacteria Streptococcus lactis and Leuconostoc citrovorum
  • Crème fraîche, slightly fermented cream
    • Clotted cream, thick spoonable cream made by heating
    • Smetana, Central and Eastern European variety of sour cream
  • Cultured buttermilk, fermented concentrated (water removed) milk using the same bacteria as sour cream
  • Kefir, fermented milk resembling buttermilk but based on different yeast and bacteria culture
  • Kumis/Airag, slightly fermented mares' milk popular in Central Asia
  • Milk powder (or powdered milk), produced by removing the water from milk
    • Whole milk products
    • Buttermilk products
    • Skim milk
    • Whey products
    • Ice Cream
    • High milk-fat & nutritional products (for infant formulas)
    • Cultured and confectionery products
  • Condensed milk, milk which has been concentrated by evaporation, often with sugar added for longer life in an opened can
  • Khava, milk which has been completely concentrated by evaporation, used in Indian sweets (Gulab Jamun, Pedha and many more)
  • Evaporated milk, (less concentrated than condensed) milk without added sugar
  • Ricotta cheese, milk heated and reduced in volume, known in Indian cuisine as Khoa
  • Infant formula, dried milk powder with specific additives for feeding human infants
  • Baked milk, a variety of boiled milk that has been particularly popular in Russia
• Butter, mostly milk fat, produced by churning cream
  • Buttermilk, the liquid left over after producing butter from cream, often dried as livestock food
  • Ghee, clarified butter, by gentle heating of butter and removal of the solid matter
  • Smen, a fermented clarified butter used in Moroccan cooking.
  • Anhydrous milkfat
• Cheese, produced by coagulating milk, separating from whey and letting it ripen, generally with bacteria and sometimes also with certain molds
  • Curds, the soft curdled part of milk (or skim milk) used to make cheese (or casein)
  • Paneer
  • Whey, the liquid drained from curds and used for further processing or as a livestock food
  • Cottage cheese
  • Quark
  • Cream cheese, produced by the addition of cream to milk and then curdled to form a rich curd or cheese made from skim milk with cream added to the curd
  • Fromage frais
• Casein
  • Caseinates
  • Milk protein concentrates and isolates
  • Whey protein concentrates and isolates
  • Hydrolysates
  • Mineral concentrates
• Yogurt, milk fermented by Streptococcus salivarius ssp. thermophilus and Lactobacillus delbrueckii ssp. bulgaricus sometimes with additional bacteria, such as Lactobacillus acidophilus
  • Ayran
  • Lassi
• Clabber, milk naturally fermented to a yogurt-like state
• Gelato, slowly frozen milk and water, lesser fat than ice cream
• Ice cream, slowly frozen cream and emulsifying additives
  • Ice milk
  • Frozen custard
  • Frozen yogurt, yogurt with emulsifiers that is frozen
• Other
  • Viili
  • Kajmak
  • Filmjölk
  • Piimä
  • Vla
  • Dulce de leche
  • Skyr

Health risks of consuming dairy products

Most dairy products contain large amounts of saturated fat.

Some dairy products may cause health issues for individuals who have a lactose intolerance and milk allergies. Some dairy products such as blue cheese may become contaminated with the fungus Aspergillus fumigatus during ripening, which can trigger asthma and other respiratory problems in susceptible individuals.^[2][3][4] Vegans and some other vegetarians avoid dairy products due to a variety of ethical, dietary, environmental, political, and religious concerns.

Further information: Dairy allergy

See also

Agriculture and Agronomy portal

• Fermented milk products

References

1. ^ http://www.food.gov.uk/multimedia/pdfs/publication/understandfoodlabellingterms.pdf
2. ^ Agin, Khosrow. "Seroprevalence of specific immunoglobulin G antibodies against aspergillus fumigatus among chronic persistent asthma". http://journals.sbmu.ac.ir/index.php/ijcid/article/viewArticle/53. Retrieved 11 June 2009. 
3. ^ El-Gendy, S. M.; A. A. El-Badawi. "Aspergillus fumigatus as a contaminant in blue-veined cheese production". http://www.fstadirect.com/GetRecord.aspx?AN=1976-10-P-1990. Retrieved 11 June 2009. 
4. ^ Škrinjar Marija, M. et al.. "Frequency of Aspergillus fumigatus fres.: A toxigenic and allergenic fungal species in milking cows feeds throughout one research year". http://www.doiserbia.nb.rs/Article.aspx?id=0352-49060916101S. Retrieved 11 June 2009. 

External links

• International Dairy School
• Questions and Answers on dairy products
• MilkAcademy - Applicable information about milking equipments and dairy farming