I’m lactose intolerant. Even if I was lactose tolerant, I wouldn’t drink it. I don’t like the taste of milk. Wasser ist besser.

I read somewhere that cow’s milk is difficult to digest for humans (too much protein), and that we’re the only animal on the planet to drink another animal’s milk. Not to mention all the lactose-intolerant people running around these days.

I’ll all for giving it up as well, more so now that milk is becoming an ever-larger part of my weekly budget!

Great post. My wife and I had been pondering this very thing recently.

So do you extend this to all dairy products or just milk? Why or why not?

Almond milk is also a great substitute. And, of course, you can make “milk” from just about anything. For example, if you want to make almond milk just mix a cup of almonds with 3 cups of (you guessed it…) water and desired sweetner if desired to taste (we prefer agave) in a blender (preferably a vitamix or industrial blender). There you have it. I’ve also made cashew milk. I haven’t done a price comparision on the store-bought almond milk to my home-made kind. That’s my homework: to see if it’s actually cost effective.
And, in response to Jacob’s claim that water subs well in cereal…Well, my wife and I have mostly cut out cold cereal (we keep some around for when there’s no time to prepare oatmeal). But since I use just water in our oatmeal (plus one banana–that’s all the sweetner needed), I see no reason why we couldn’t use water in our cereal.

Seriously lactose intolerant. Love milk, cheese, and dairy products in general. Will never give it up. So what if it makes me stay in the bathroom and experience burning pain for the whole night? Pain builds character.

Actually milk is one of the most unhealthy things you can drink.

50 years ago, the government decided that milk was healthy, and everyone grew up thinking how healthy it is.

But times have changed. Research on the internet shows how incredibly unhealthy milk (and other dairy products) are.

Here’s the interesting thing. If I tell people that milk is unhealthy, they look at me like I am crazy. Just like if you tell them that you don’t need a car (a la Jacob).

I think the biggest challenge for most people to improve their finances, and their lives, is not anything that they lack. It is not wanting to open up our minds to new ideas.

I too would like to know – what about cheese?!? And haven’t milk based products been around since the middle ages?

The same argument against milk can, (and is), used against grain products. Until ~10,000 years ago, the blink of an eye evolutionarily, humans could not consume grains and subsisted purely from hunting and gathering.

The paleo-diet is based on what humans been bred to eat by evolution. Of course, if you believe that humans were created here 6,000 years ago …

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleo_diet
http://www.marksdailyapple.com/
http://freetheanimal.com/

I have long hair – how do I un-tangle it? Then I could switch off shampoo/conditioner.

And how about all the advances in food, medicine etc. I often try to make food the way it was made long ago, but how far back can we go?

We don’t do or use half the things they did back in the 1600, 1700 or even 1800s, let alone the stone age or say, Apocalypto age.

Hunter/gatherer-ers also worked a lot harder than any of us. Thus, heavy meat worked perfect – restored muscle mass, even though now we have beans and broccoli, etc. They also didn’t live as long, and I bet had heart disease or some sort of ailment that we would never really know.

I hear a challenge coming on…

…and is it possible to sustain a garden and chickens on a boat?

Prof. Keith Woodford claims that “newer” cow races produces, due to a mutation, unhealhty milk. A2 milk should be ok, A1 milk is alledgedly linked to heart disease and Type 1 diabetes.

I have no idea if he’s right. Here’s his book:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/1603581022/?tag=oildepletio03-20

Photoguy, most of us in the western world do not need an extra source of protein or calories in our diet. I think about 2 ounces of protein a day covers whatever it is that you need. Most of us are taking in more calories than we need as well. In addition to all this, I believe that cows in the US are treated with some of the same antibiotics that are used to treat humans in order to make them grow faster and not spread bad bacteria. However, when you do this, you may be giving the people drinking the milk antibiotics that they do not necessarily need leading to more antibiotic resistant strains of particular bacteria.

That said, I went from being a person who only drank soy milk to a person who drinks about a pint of 2% milk every week. Women are more susceptible to things like osteoporosis, and you can get calcium from milk and other sources of dairy. I plan to go back to consuming much less milk in the future.

Do baby’s require cow’s milk? I’ve heard that baby’s need milk until about the age of 2. Is this true or is it possible to raise a healthy child without cow’s milk and without breast milk after age 1?

I love almost everything about your blog Jacob except some of your diet advice. Like this about milk – true, it is very popular right now for people to give up milk, say it is terrible for you, unnatural, etc. etc. I would like to give an alternate viewpoint.

The only “natural” drink for an adult human could be said to be water. If cow’s milk is unnatural, then give up all juices, coffees, teas, etc (and soda obviously, but I doubt most of us drink that).

The milk you buy in a store nowadays is about as far removed from natural cow’s milk as it is possible to be. Hyper inbred for larger pituitary glands and fed incredibly unhealthy diets for the sake of volume of milk production, modern cows are very unhealthy and usually only live 3 or 4 years max, vs, 10 to 15 year “natural” productive life. (BTW, dairy farmers are in a hard place – prices they get per 100 lb of milk are still about the same as 60 YEARS ago!) Most cows have chronic illnesses and there is a great deal of pus and infections that make it into the milk -the USDA has certain “acceptable levels.” Killing the bacteria by pasteurization does not remove the impurities. Add in major hormone and antibiotic contamination and yes, store-bought milk from sad and diseased cattle is a terrible and poisonous substance. I do avoid it whenever possible, especially since learning about the Johne’s disease in cattle/Crohn’s disease in humans connection.

HOWEVER, grassfed raw milk is AWESOME! First, it naturally contains lactase, the enzyme needed to digest lactose. (Calves don’t produce enough lactase either all on their own, interestingly) So, the majority of “lactose intolerant” people CAN tolerate raw grassfed milk just fine! Also, pasteurization kills phosphatase in milk, which is what is necessary to absorb the calcium effectively. Raw milk enables you to get all the benefit of the calcium in what truly is one of the most bioavailable forms out there. Grassfed raw milk is at least as healthy for you as wild salmon – research the CLA and other benefits found in it. Cattle are designed to eat grass and they are happy, healthy, and long lived when they are able to get all of their nutrition from grass and NOT grain. Raw milk has antibodies from the cow in it, such that experiments have been done infecting raw milk with pathogens and the antibodies killed all the germs! The milk also has properties that help irritated stomachs and intestines.

Finally, in personal experience, I started drinking grassfed raw milk 4 or 5 years ago. I was worried it might taste weird. It has subtle flavor differences in each swallow, like a good wine, but it tastes great. I am lucky to live in CA where I can buy it in stores and even though it is super expensive it is the only milk I buy now. For a few months last year I stopped buying milk because I was trying to save $. I did not miss it much at the time but my health did go down – you could say that I was just not balancing my diet well enough, but I will say that my body really, really craved the milk. As soon as I bought some and took the first sip, my body was like “phew!” Obviously, it is a topic I am passionate about and I have gotten several friends and family members started on it too. They have all noticed a difference for the better. Please do not say that all milk is bad and unnatural for humans – we humans constantly do “unnatural” things, and many of them are good, like reading. The way the milk is produced is what makes a difference. Oh, and grassfed cattle can not only use land that is unsuitable for farming, but properly managed they vastly increase soil health and fertility.

For some references, please see westonaprice.org or realmilk.com

I’ve been going to a small dairy and buying raw milk. Because it is non-homogenized I use it to make butter, cream, whipped cream, yogurt, yogurt cheese, whey, and if there is any left over I drink the milk. Although I’m told it doesn’t go bad if you don’t drink it fast enough, it should make sourmilk. At $3/gallon I get all my dairy products pretty cheaply.

Thanks for the pointers about the possible bad health effects of milk. I had not heard of the difference between A1 and A2 proteins, and although a cursory inspection of research papers suggest that the issue is very much up the air, it’s worth knowing about. Also I will check into the issues with anti-biotics, etc.

Great point about drinking milk is just not natural. My oldest son is extremely allergic to milk in any form, so we have been drinking soy milk for some time.

When we made the switch for him, I did it as well and can no longer even think about drinking milk.

Some counter-arguments:

1) You are using this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_nature.

2) There is lactose free milk

3) Milk is a source of proteins and fats, they are awesome in a muscle building diet. And there is Calcium.

I think that anyone who says that milk is always good/bad is probably wrong. Different people need different diets. Milk will be good for some people and bad for others.

I’ve never liked milk and consequently never bother to buy it. I know many people who throw away money on milk because they only consume a fraction of it before it spoils. I’ve probably saved a small fortune not buying milk, this small fortune has now been invested and is providing me a small passive monthly income.

I had a long break from milk and leaned towards the paleo side, but in recent times loosened up. I don’t drink milk but do make greek yoghurt, labneh and paneer – all of which seem pretty cost effective when buying 4+ pints at a time.

This is a bit shortsighted, Jacob. Cows get their calcium from their food, but as you so rightly pointed out, we are not cows. So we cannot get as much calcium from eating the same food as cows. Milk and other products made from milk are a very good source of calcium. If you don’t drink milk, you have to make sure you get your calcium from elsewhere.

Lots of people develop osteoporosis over their lifetime. To prevent that you need both vitamin D and calcium to maintain bone strength for as long as is possible.