Not trynna be the token vegan/health nut - just wanted to share:
I fuck with oatmilk- it’s pretty fuckin good for what it is and it’s bomb in some cereal. Don’t gotta cut out milk but maybe instead of 2 gallons you do one of each or somethin idk
The problem is that dairy subsides make cow milk less expensive than it should be. Those subsidies should be reallocated to environmentally-friendly alternatives. The average shopper at the store is going to look at the price tags and pick the one that’s like half the cost.
I am also simultaneously asking myself if prices for oatmilk are fair. Where I live the cheapest option is 1€ for a liter. But if you ever made oatmilk by yourself, you know how cheap it is do do it at home.
I know I’m just lazy as f*, so I am not doing it and therefore should not rant. But I am really curious what’s behind this pricing, other than higher tax than on milk.
Logistics. It’s just oat water but it comes from far away. Just make it yourself.
You would make your own oatmeal, right? Who tf would buy premade oatmeal with the water already in it? If a few people start doing it themselves, they will drop the price of the ready-made stuff.
I’ve done this before and it is very simple, but you do need a blender. It works in a pinch but I’d much rather just buy a carton of it.
The problem I’ve found is that it’s very tricky to filter properly. If you don’t filter it at all then you end up with a grainy product, but it’s far too thick to go through something like a coffee filter without clogging it up so you need to use cheesecloth.
Another problem is storage. Making it in small quantities as you need it is fine as long as you’re ok with it being room temperature, but if you want to make enough to keep in the fridge then the oats are going to begin to separate from the water almost immediately unless you add an emulsifier.
Economies of scale. Oatmilk is not nearly as big of a market and therefore tends to be more expensive per gallon
Dairy subsidies. Dairy farmers can be pretty heavily subsidized, depending on the country, making the milk artificially cheap
Marketing. Oatmilk is mostly consumed by upper middle class (sub)urban folks who have enough disposable income to worry about things like animal welfare and the environment, and thus are willing to pay a premium for eco-friendly products. Companies know this so a lot of oatmilk is positioned and priced as a premium product.
In a way it’s sort of disgusting that capitalism is exploiting your desire to save the planet for extra profits, however that’s how it is generally designed to operate: nothing happens unless there is a profit to be made from it.
Yeah that’s always the tricky bit with making “change” - not everybody can afford it, but those who can should keep that in mind and maybe bump a bit more for those who can’t
The fact that people are waving this hard for oatmilk, shows me that there must be a genetical component of people, who can’t taste certain elements of oatmilk. For me it it tastes watery, like even below 1,5% fat and it smells unpleasant, with a subtile kind of moldy/rotten in it. I drink about a liter of milk every day and I would not want that even in my coffee, let alone pure or in my cornflakes.
This shouldn’t mean people shouldn’t try or even like oatmilk, but it’s no replacement for me, not even close.
Do as you want but for everyone reading this thread, I thought it was a good resource to add.
And also keep in mind, the animal agriculture lobby is huge and they publish biased counter studies with questionable methods.
The osteoporosis thing has mostly be debunked. It’s old women who can be effected by it, most everyone else isn’t. Of course living vegan can be healthier if you get your blood levels checked regularly and take supplements, but most of the food tastes worse too. It depends on what’s more important to you personally. The linked article’s study, to me, is compromised, they even admit it themselves by acknowledging it’s more a general animal protein thing.
I think a lot of people who switch to non-dairy milk never really liked to drink milk in the first place. It was easy for them to switch. I had to cut dairy when I had a baby with a milk allergy and it was so hard. None of the milk alternatives taste anything like cow milk. I hated all of them. Vegan cheese is pretty terrible, too. Even the most expensive fancy cashew ones taste significantly worse than the cheapest cow milk cheese. I did like Daiya’s smoked gouda and nutritional yeast is pretty good, but other than that I was so glad to have cow milk back in my diet after a year of being dairy-free. I like meat alternatives but dairy alternatives are just bad. I hope science figures it out.
That baby with the dairy allergy outgrew the allergy but still prefers oat milk.
For the record I grew up drinking 2-3 glasses of whole milk a day. Your conclusion may be logical, but I don’t think that means it represents the populace by any means just because it makes sense.
That’s quite a logic leap there if I’m being honest.
I grey up drinking whole milk and having 2-3 glasses a day, I love milk.
I buy the purple Silk brand that has the extra protein in it (red ribbon printed on the carton) and I’m telling you it’s gas in cereal. By itself, it’s still not whole milk - don’t get me wrong, it’s just 30x less watery than almond milk was but maybe the protein one is thicker or something idk.
I’m hoping they sell this good stuff here too at some point. I haven’t stopped trying to find an alternative, I too would like to reduce animal suffering.
I find it really depends on the brand. I have no idea what the differences really are (or even how it’s made in the first place) but in my experience around half are as you describe and half are delicious
Just look out that oat is a carb. If you’re having oat milk with cereal then you’re having carb with carb.
This is another straw on the camels back to svrewing up your sugar levels and potentially giving you diabetes.
I’m no super healthy guy, but a friend of mine had this issue where they were on the high glucose side due to their diet, this was one of the things they needed to cut out.
It does still use less water than cow milk though, so if someone switches from cow milk to almond milk then it’s still a net improvement in terms of water usage
True but the cow is also used for things like beef once slaughtered. A nut on the other hand is simply used up after being harvested.
A lot of the cow water figures get complicated quickly as well since various calculations either include or ignore indirect water usage. Things like water usage for their feed. Or whether the water usage is counting across an entire cows average lifespan, including slaughter and all byproducts, or just the water usage while the cow is producing milk.
This makes it hard to directly compare to something more simple like growing a nut or oats where the end product is essentially singular. There are a lot of variables to consider when trying to compare to a product from a farmed animal.
The more steps of complexity there are in the system the less efficient it is, this seems incredibly obvious to me? Turning plants into cow flesh is less efficient than just eating plants.
I mean, if oat milk is going to make you less healthy, why are we concerned about the water usage if it’s still a better alternative to cows milk on both counts?
There’s no industrial water usage in sticks I find when out walking. That doesn’t mean I’m going to put them in my cereal (intentional hyperbole to make the point).
That’s also the case for animal milk. And compared to what’s in the average cereal you can forget about the oat milk. Just take a little bit less of your cereal (and maybe add a bit of nuts/seeds) and you should be good to go.
Man, nut milks (hah) and oat milk are fantastic. I’m not vegan, but I absolutely support reducing the animal products you consume. Milk is a big deal for me, and while they don’t always quite satisfy in the same way, animal milk alternatives are pretty awesome.
Personally I prefer soy milk since it generally requires the least resources and also has the highest amount of bioavailable protein.
Oat is pretty good though.
I didn’t like soy milk at all when I was younger (like a teenager). It had a weird aftertaste and texture. I don’t know if it has changed since then or not, but now I also find it generally the tastiest.
I also use organic soy milk (since it is usually the only type that doesn’t have gums or other ingredients…just soybeans and water) to make really simple plain yogurt too. I just break open a probiotic capsule or two into a 1qt tetrapak bottle, shake it up really good, divy up into 1c mason jars, and run the Instant Pot Yogurt setting for 15-16 hours.
That yogurt gets made into parfaits or overnight oats (with some date syrup if I can’t find it…or just maple syrup to sweeten). Sometimes I’ll even make a really good soft serve frozen yogurt (mix 1 part sugar to 4 parts yogurt, freeze 6+ hours, put it in a good blender, add fruit or vanilla or cocoa (or all!) as desired.
Mmm I sorta agree with you but soy milk and soy plantations in general (or whatever the proper name is for a farm of soybeans) definitely contribute to deforestation it takes a lot of land to turn out enough product
Here’s a quick mention in a posting I found - I’m sure there are some studies out there if you’re interested
Can’t opt out of capitalism while living under it imo. Especially when it’s as systemic as it is. Not opting for any other governing style or economy really - I’m pretty ignorant on alternatives besides traditonal bartering. I just think it’s pretty obvious to anyone under the boot that this isn’t working.
I’d say the best course would be to beat them at their own game and rewrite the rules yourself I guess
almost all soy, including what is grown in the region formerly occupied by the amazon, is pressed for oil for human use, only about 7% of it is fed directly to animals. after processing the soy forhuman use, the waste product is what is given to animals, and cows get only a fraction of the soy. most of the soy fed to animals goes to poultry and swine.
When we look at the most common extraction method for soybean oil (using hexane solvents), soybean meal for animal feed (not oil) is the driver of demand
However, soybean meal is the main driving force for soybean oil production due to its significant amount of productivity and revenues
[…]
soybean meal and hulls contribute to over 60% of total revenues, with meal taking the largest portion of over 59% of total revenue
This is even more true of other methods like expelling which is still somewhat commonly used
Moreover, soybean meal is the driving force for the whole process [expelling oil from soy] because it provides over 70% of the total revenue for soy processing by expelling
your five-year-old study might seem to be relevant on the surface, but you will find that the data sources for, for instance, biodiesel prices date to 1999. it is not ph.d. level research. i would expect something of this caliber from a rigorous high school.
i’m so glad you found the OWID link. do you see how the chart shows the vast majority of what is fed to animals is called “soy meal” or “soy cake”? that’s the byproduct of pressing soybeans for oil. they literally eat our industrial waste. down at the bottom of the chart you can see the 7% that is fed directly to animals
your seven-year-old research about soy markets is outdated. while the oil has always been worth far more than its weight in the bean, it is now around 50/50, even though beans are only about 20% oil.
i went vegetarian a few months ago and ive been losing weight and muscle like crazy. i haven’t figured out how to maintain it. everything tastes good though
Adjust your diet. Add pea or soy protein powder if you need to and make sure you’re eating a lot of beans and tofu and tempeh. Most likely losing muscle is due to protein deficiency so that’s your answer.
It’s really tough. There’s a lot we’re still learning about the gut and nutrient absorption- but as long as we protect science, we can expect improvements.
The work with gene editing and growing meats and whatnot has been a long time coming - stay optimistic, stay curious! ❤️
Not trynna be the token vegan/health nut - just wanted to share:
I fuck with oatmilk- it’s pretty fuckin good for what it is and it’s bomb in some cereal. Don’t gotta cut out milk but maybe instead of 2 gallons you do one of each or somethin idk
The problem is that dairy subsides make cow milk less expensive than it should be. Those subsidies should be reallocated to environmentally-friendly alternatives. The average shopper at the store is going to look at the price tags and pick the one that’s like half the cost.
I am also simultaneously asking myself if prices for oatmilk are fair. Where I live the cheapest option is 1€ for a liter. But if you ever made oatmilk by yourself, you know how cheap it is do do it at home. I know I’m just lazy as f*, so I am not doing it and therefore should not rant. But I am really curious what’s behind this pricing, other than higher tax than on milk.
Logistics. It’s just oat water but it comes from far away. Just make it yourself.
You would make your own oatmeal, right? Who tf would buy premade oatmeal with the water already in it? If a few people start doing it themselves, they will drop the price of the ready-made stuff.
I’ve done this before and it is very simple, but you do need a blender. It works in a pinch but I’d much rather just buy a carton of it.
The problem I’ve found is that it’s very tricky to filter properly. If you don’t filter it at all then you end up with a grainy product, but it’s far too thick to go through something like a coffee filter without clogging it up so you need to use cheesecloth.
Another problem is storage. Making it in small quantities as you need it is fine as long as you’re ok with it being room temperature, but if you want to make enough to keep in the fridge then the oats are going to begin to separate from the water almost immediately unless you add an emulsifier.
There’s a couple reasons behind this:
In a way it’s sort of disgusting that capitalism is exploiting your desire to save the planet for extra profits, however that’s how it is generally designed to operate: nothing happens unless there is a profit to be made from it.
Yeah that’s always the tricky bit with making “change” - not everybody can afford it, but those who can should keep that in mind and maybe bump a bit more for those who can’t
The fact that people are waving this hard for oatmilk, shows me that there must be a genetical component of people, who can’t taste certain elements of oatmilk. For me it it tastes watery, like even below 1,5% fat and it smells unpleasant, with a subtile kind of moldy/rotten in it. I drink about a liter of milk every day and I would not want that even in my coffee, let alone pure or in my cornflakes.
This shouldn’t mean people shouldn’t try or even like oatmilk, but it’s no replacement for me, not even close.
Drinking a litre of milk every day can’t be healthy. It causes osteoporosis and can raise your cholesterol levels.
https://iphysio.io/osteoporosis/
Do as you want but for everyone reading this thread, I thought it was a good resource to add. And also keep in mind, the animal agriculture lobby is huge and they publish biased counter studies with questionable methods.
The osteoporosis thing has mostly be debunked. It’s old women who can be effected by it, most everyone else isn’t. Of course living vegan can be healthier if you get your blood levels checked regularly and take supplements, but most of the food tastes worse too. It depends on what’s more important to you personally. The linked article’s study, to me, is compromised, they even admit it themselves by acknowledging it’s more a general animal protein thing.
I think a lot of people who switch to non-dairy milk never really liked to drink milk in the first place. It was easy for them to switch. I had to cut dairy when I had a baby with a milk allergy and it was so hard. None of the milk alternatives taste anything like cow milk. I hated all of them. Vegan cheese is pretty terrible, too. Even the most expensive fancy cashew ones taste significantly worse than the cheapest cow milk cheese. I did like Daiya’s smoked gouda and nutritional yeast is pretty good, but other than that I was so glad to have cow milk back in my diet after a year of being dairy-free. I like meat alternatives but dairy alternatives are just bad. I hope science figures it out.
That baby with the dairy allergy outgrew the allergy but still prefers oat milk.
For the record I grew up drinking 2-3 glasses of whole milk a day. Your conclusion may be logical, but I don’t think that means it represents the populace by any means just because it makes sense.
This so much.
That’s quite a logic leap there if I’m being honest.
I grey up drinking whole milk and having 2-3 glasses a day, I love milk.
I buy the purple Silk brand that has the extra protein in it (red ribbon printed on the carton) and I’m telling you it’s gas in cereal. By itself, it’s still not whole milk - don’t get me wrong, it’s just 30x less watery than almond milk was but maybe the protein one is thicker or something idk.
I’m hoping they sell this good stuff here too at some point. I haven’t stopped trying to find an alternative, I too would like to reduce animal suffering.
I find it really depends on the brand. I have no idea what the differences really are (or even how it’s made in the first place) but in my experience around half are as you describe and half are delicious
Smell and taste seems to very a lot between people. I’m not even surprised.
I love oat milk, personally.
Just look out that oat is a carb. If you’re having oat milk with cereal then you’re having carb with carb.
This is another straw on the camels back to svrewing up your sugar levels and potentially giving you diabetes.
I’m no super healthy guy, but a friend of mine had this issue where they were on the high glucose side due to their diet, this was one of the things they needed to cut out.
Almond milk I think was the better alternative.
Almond milk also requires 6x as much water to produce than oat milk. Almonds in general are a very high water usage crop.
It does still use less water than cow milk though, so if someone switches from cow milk to almond milk then it’s still a net improvement in terms of water usage
True but the cow is also used for things like beef once slaughtered. A nut on the other hand is simply used up after being harvested.
A lot of the cow water figures get complicated quickly as well since various calculations either include or ignore indirect water usage. Things like water usage for their feed. Or whether the water usage is counting across an entire cows average lifespan, including slaughter and all byproducts, or just the water usage while the cow is producing milk.
This makes it hard to directly compare to something more simple like growing a nut or oats where the end product is essentially singular. There are a lot of variables to consider when trying to compare to a product from a farmed animal.
The more steps of complexity there are in the system the less efficient it is, this seems incredibly obvious to me? Turning plants into cow flesh is less efficient than just eating plants.
A lot of nuts are very high water usage crops. It’s a gallon per almond but almost five for a walnut.
I mean, if oat milk is going to make you less healthy, why are we concerned about the water usage if it’s still a better alternative to cows milk on both counts?
There’s no industrial water usage in sticks I find when out walking. That doesn’t mean I’m going to put them in my cereal (intentional hyperbole to make the point).
That’s also the case for animal milk. And compared to what’s in the average cereal you can forget about the oat milk. Just take a little bit less of your cereal (and maybe add a bit of nuts/seeds) and you should be good to go.
What’s also the case for animal milk sorry?
Both contain carbs and mixed with cereal you’re eating carbs with carbs 🙂
Man, nut milks (hah) and oat milk are fantastic. I’m not vegan, but I absolutely support reducing the animal products you consume. Milk is a big deal for me, and while they don’t always quite satisfy in the same way, animal milk alternatives are pretty awesome.
I agree. Oatmilk is my go to, especially if I’m mixing it with something. I find the flavors blend better
Personally I prefer soy milk since it generally requires the least resources and also has the highest amount of bioavailable protein.
Oat is pretty good though.
I didn’t like soy milk at all when I was younger (like a teenager). It had a weird aftertaste and texture. I don’t know if it has changed since then or not, but now I also find it generally the tastiest.
I also use organic soy milk (since it is usually the only type that doesn’t have gums or other ingredients…just soybeans and water) to make really simple plain yogurt too. I just break open a probiotic capsule or two into a 1qt tetrapak bottle, shake it up really good, divy up into 1c mason jars, and run the Instant Pot Yogurt setting for 15-16 hours.
That yogurt gets made into parfaits or overnight oats (with some date syrup if I can’t find it…or just maple syrup to sweeten). Sometimes I’ll even make a really good soft serve frozen yogurt (mix 1 part sugar to 4 parts yogurt, freeze 6+ hours, put it in a good blender, add fruit or vanilla or cocoa (or all!) as desired.
Mmm I sorta agree with you but soy milk and soy plantations in general (or whatever the proper name is for a farm of soybeans) definitely contribute to deforestation it takes a lot of land to turn out enough product
Here’s a quick mention in a posting I found - I’m sure there are some studies out there if you’re interested
https://bastyr.edu/about/news/which-milk-alternative-most-eco-friendly
The deforestation is to grow soy to feed cows to make milk and beef.
Kinda frustrating when the environmental alternative to dairy milk…is being planted in the former Amazon Rainforest to make dairy milk.
Can’t opt out of capitalism while living under it imo. Especially when it’s as systemic as it is. Not opting for any other governing style or economy really - I’m pretty ignorant on alternatives besides traditonal bartering. I just think it’s pretty obvious to anyone under the boot that this isn’t working.
I’d say the best course would be to beat them at their own game and rewrite the rules yourself I guess
almost all soy, including what is grown in the region formerly occupied by the amazon, is pressed for oil for human use, only about 7% of it is fed directly to animals. after processing the soy forhuman use, the waste product is what is given to animals, and cows get only a fraction of the soy. most of the soy fed to animals goes to poultry and swine.
That’s off by an order of magnitude. It’s not 7%, it’s 77%
https://ourworldindata.org/soy#more-than-three-quarters-of-global-soy-is-fed-to-animals
When we look at the most common extraction method for soybean oil (using hexane solvents), soybean meal for animal feed (not oil) is the driver of demand
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0926669017305010
This is even more true of other methods like expelling which is still somewhat commonly used
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/9/5/87
your five-year-old study might seem to be relevant on the surface, but you will find that the data sources for, for instance, biodiesel prices date to 1999. it is not ph.d. level research. i would expect something of this caliber from a rigorous high school.
i’m so glad you found the OWID link. do you see how the chart shows the vast majority of what is fed to animals is called “soy meal” or “soy cake”? that’s the byproduct of pressing soybeans for oil. they literally eat our industrial waste. down at the bottom of the chart you can see the 7% that is fed directly to animals
Byproduct that accounts for the majority of the revenue? That’s hardly a byproduct?
7%, is feeding of entire soybeans
right. which is what i said.
it’s not a majority of the revenue. it’s about half of the revenue from beans that are pressed for oil, but there are other uses.
your seven-year-old research about soy markets is outdated. while the oil has always been worth far more than its weight in the bean, it is now around 50/50, even though beans are only about 20% oil.
Not at all, pump the f— out of that sh–, it’s pretty cheap to manufacture and once economies of scale take over it will become way cheaper.
i went vegetarian a few months ago and ive been losing weight and muscle like crazy. i haven’t figured out how to maintain it. everything tastes good though
Adjust your diet. Add pea or soy protein powder if you need to and make sure you’re eating a lot of beans and tofu and tempeh. Most likely losing muscle is due to protein deficiency so that’s your answer.
i am still downing multiple whey protein shakes with cows milk. i haven’t even gone non-dairy yet
Oh well then keep doing that unless the article got to you and you want to eliminate dairy lol
i would like to. I am working out one variable at a time
It’s really tough. There’s a lot we’re still learning about the gut and nutrient absorption- but as long as we protect science, we can expect improvements.
The work with gene editing and growing meats and whatnot has been a long time coming - stay optimistic, stay curious! ❤️