Like an estimated two-thirds of the world’s population, I don’t digest lactose well, which makes the occasional latte an especially pricey proposition. So it was a pleasant surprise when, shortly after moving to San Francisco, I ordered a drink at Blue Bottle Coffee and didn’t have to ask—or pay extra—for a milk alternative. Since 2022, the once Oakland-based, now Nestlé-owned cafe chain has defaulted to oat milk, both to cut carbon emissions and because lots of its affluent-tending customers were already choosing it as their go-to.
Plant-based milks, a multibillion-dollar global market, aren’t just good for the lactose intolerant: They’re also better for the climate. Dairy cows belch a lot of methane, a greenhouse gas 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide; they contribute at least 7 percent of US methane output, the equivalent emissions of 10 million cars. Cattle need a lot of room to graze, too: Plant-based milks use about a tenth as much land to produce the same quantity of milk. And it takes almost a thousand gallons of water to manufacture a gallon of dairy milk—four times the water cost of alt-milk from oats or soy.
But if climate concerns push us toward the alt-milk aisle, dairy still has price on its side. Even though plant-based milks are generally much less resource-intensive, they’re often more expensive. Walk into any Starbucks, and you’ll likely pay around 70 cents extra for nondairy options.
. Dairy’s affordability edge, explains María Mascaraque, an analyst at market research firm Euromonitor International, relies on the industry’s ability to produce “at larger volumes, which drives down the cost per carton.” American demand for milk alternatives, though expected to grow by 10 percent a year through 2030, can’t beat those economies of scale. (Globally, alt-milks aren’t new on the scene—coconut milk is even mentioned in the Sanskrit epic Mahābhārata, which is thousands of years old.)
What else contributes to cow milk’s dominance? Dairy farmers are “political favorites,” says Daniel Sumner, a University of California, Davis, agricultural economist. In addition to support like the “Dairy Checkoff,” a joint government-industry program to promote milk products (including the “Got Milk?” campaign), they’ve long raked in direct subsidies currently worth around $1 billion a year.
Big Milk fights hard to maintain those benefits, spending more than $7 million a year on lobbying. That might help explain why the US Department of Agriculture has talked around the climate virtues of meat and dairy alternatives, refusing to factor sustainability into its dietary guidelines—and why it has featured content, such as a 2013 article by then–Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, trumpeting the dairy industry as “leading the way in sustainable innovation.”
But the USDA doesn’t directly support plant-based milk. It does subsidize some alt-milk ingredients—soybean producers, like dairy, net close to $1 billion a year on average, but that crop largely goes to feeding meat- and dairy-producing livestock and extracting oil. A 2021 report by industry analysts Mintec Limited and Frost Procurement Adventurer also notes that, while the inputs for dairy (such as cattle feed) for dairy are a little more expensive than typical plant-milk ingredients, plant alternatives face higher manufacturing costs. Alt-milk makers, Sumner says, may also have thinner profit margins: Their “strategy for growth is advertisement and promotion and publicity,” which isn’t cheap.
Starbucks, though, does benefit from economies of scale. In Europe, the company is slowly dropping premiums for alt-milks, a move it attributes to wanting to lower corporate emissions. “Market-level conditions allow us to move more quickly” than other companies, a spokesperson for the coffee giant told me, but didn’t say if or when the price drop would happen elsewhere.
In the United States, meanwhile, it’s a waiting game to see whether the government or corporations drive down alt-milk costs. Currently, Sumner says, plant-based milk producers operate under an assumption that “price isn’t the main thing” for their buyers—as long as enough privileged consumers will pay up, alt-milk can fill a premium niche. But it’s going to take a bigger market than that to make real progress in curbing emissions from food.
One thing nobody has commented on - how that article slips in a seemingly positive mention of Nestlé (they own the cafe that uses plant milks). That raised my eyebrows.
Always follow the money. Nobody does journalism for free.
Probably because everyone tried only the shittiest alt-malks, assume they are all bad, and somehow don’t get heartburn and diarrhea and gunky mouth and throat feel from cow milk. I save all my lactose intolerance suffering for cheese and ice cream.
Seriously though it’s the same as people that say only bad things about tofu but have only eaten white American ‘recipes’ that genuinely suck. Meanwhile Asians happily inhaling literal tons of it prepared in actually good meals. Try making bread from scratch without salt (or salty ingredients) and that’s what tofu foods for the white market remind me of.
everyone tried only the shittiest alt-malks
well i dont have 5 euro to dish out on a carton of altmilk every time i want to make an omelette
yall have an excess of money and it shows
More like gurgling stomach pain. That said in most cooking I generally just use cow milk and hope it goes better than drinking it straight. Most of them, even if they claim to be a 1:1 replacement can’t serve the same purpose in a lot of recipes. One time I was doing a midnight pantry raid and made Mac and white cheese with iirc almond milk. It became almost identical to white chocolate melted over noodles.
The dairy lobby in the US is huge money. If you ever want to know why we’re making a seemingly stupid decision follow the money, look at the entrenched interests and read some history. We subsidize dairy farmers because we used to subsidize dairy farmers and they spent a bunch of their earnings lobbying for more subsidies.
Because milking nuts is hard. Their teats are so small!
I don’t see why dairy should be subsidized but some plant milks aren’t exactly environmentally friendly either. The best can be said is they’re better than dairy, assuming the same land could be used for both. But they can be devastating in their own right. E.g. to grow 1 almond (i.e. one kernel) takes over 3 gallons of water. Other crops used to make milk like oats have lower water consumption.
The almond example is frequently brought up, but this is still half of what dairy milk requires, without taking into account the difference in land use too
Oat milk > Almond milk. Almond milk has a weird and bitter taste to it, oat milk doesn’t.
I also like the coconut water with rice drinks, but they hardly classify as milk even tho some brands may claim it’s a milk alternative.
Because lots of people in your country drink it, like it, and even more eat things made from it. Like cheese.
“Two thirds of people can’t tolerate lactose” is utterly fucking meaningless in this context. Most of those are in Asia. Last I checked, it was countries giving out subsidies, not some nebulous world council.
And nearly all farming gets subsidised, because that reduces reliance on external countries. You’ve seen what capitalism did to housing. You don’t want that to happen to food.
Americans are at 36% lactose intolerant. Which is surprisingly, to me anyways, high.
And should corn and cattle get the bulk of the subsidies? If it’s about food alone, maybe not.
Except almonds. Almonds are terrible water wasters, and mostly grown in California where they can least afford the water.
Almond is the worst of the nut milks, but it’s STILL way better for the environment than dairy.
Still more efficient on resource utilization than animal agriculture. If you hate almond milk for that reason, you should want the dairy industry completely abolished.
Shit, you should want all animal agriculture banned.
Based and correct.
Eh, there are plenty of use cases where certain land types aren’t really arable. Ruminants fill that niche easily.
The catch is that like 80% of the land used for livestock currently could also use crops instead.
Fwiw US dairy plans to be carbon neutral by 2050.
The bigger catch is that 70% of all crops we grow go to our livestock.
We wouldn’t need to use those lands if we just ate less meat.
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The bigger catch is that 70% of all crops we grow go to our livestock.
this isn’t true
Livestock accounts for 77% of global farming land, while supplying only 18% of calories and 37% of protein.
I don’t want it gone but I don’t want it subsidized. I’m not planning on being vegan but I’m cutting out a ton of animal protein from my life. I make it a special thing.
I feel like trying to compare a water intensive crop grown in a place known for drought to crops that can be grown in many places where water is far more readily available is being a bit disingenuous. You’re not comparing apples to apples.
Because most plant juice tastes like shit and has the wrong mouth-feel for most things we use cow milk for. Its not rocket surgery.
This is too narrow. Why do we subsidize food at all? America is supposed to be free market capitalists, right? Subsidies don’t fit that definition?
(in reality, farmers need some sort of support system, I believe, as do we all, but subsidies don’t fit the free market capitalism narrative.)
We’ll you’re pointing out how ridiculous it is to believe in a free market. Because one has never existed. What ought we subsidize though? Obviously foods that are better for our environment, climate, health, economy and for animal welfare.
Dairy, meat and egg coalitions have known for years that subsidies and marketing are things they need to pursue for greater success, they’ve used tactics similar to tobacco companies with their marketing and they’ve used lobbying tactics similar to oil and gas giants as well. It’s clear we need to stop subsidizing them.
Subsidies only benefit the big “farms” (industrial operations) and encourage producing the subsidized crop regardless of its value. The incentives are so perverse that farms end up dumping their milk because there is no market for the amount produced.
Personally am in favor of eliminating all food subsidies. Making food valuable could eliminate so many of our other societal problems - poor health, destruction of natural resources, overpopulation.
There are very obvious negative side effects to making food more expensive.
you can just subsidize food generally if that’s the worry
You can… But we’ve chosen to subsidize farming since that tends to be the raw ingredients. So in a way all food is kinda subsidized.
I can come up with my own, but what are some of the side effects you’re thinking of? Right now food is so cheap that most people’s only metric is price, with no consideration for quality, nutrition, environmental impact, etc. Most of what we are eating isn’t really food, just an engineered combination of four or five heavily subsidized crops.
Right now food is so cheap that most people’s only metric is price
This makes no sense to me - people can choose healthy or unhealthy options because food is so cheap generally. Do you think that if food becomes expensive people will buy more healthy food for… reasons?
Most of what we are eating isn’t really food, just an engineered combination of four or five heavily subsidized crops.
This is pure bullshit.
Maybe you don’t live in the US. At least here, people spend a smaller portion of their income on food than any society at any time in history, but the most on health care. Not getting into the many reasons health care is so expensive, the fact that food is an afterthought has clearly led to major health issues. So what I am suggesting is that if we had to give more weight to decisions around food it could lead to better choices for our health. My bias is that I’m against the direction our society is heading tech-wise, so in my scenario people would be spending more time with their families and communities and less time and money rampantly consuming products.
Regarding your second comment, how would you describe the majority of products in grocery stores if not what I claimed they are?
So what I am suggesting is that if we had to give more weight to decisions around food it could lead to better choices for our health.
You think making food more expensive is going to make people make better choices about what food they buy? I don’t think you live in the US, I think you live in fantasy land.
My bias is that I’m against the direction our society is heading tech-wise, so in my scenario people would be spending more time with their families and communities and less time and money rampantly consuming products.
🙄
Regarding your second comment, how would you describe the majority of products in grocery stores if not what I claimed they are?
“Food”.
It it doesn’t come from a mammal it ain’t milk.
And if it grows on a vine it ain’t a vegetable. Yet we have tomatoes, and nobody is putting them in fruit salad.
Culinary definition != scientific definition.
Because it tastes like shit. And I don’t even drink milk but you can’t even cook with the substitute shit.
I don’t believe you have used the correct plant milks for the correct uses.
- Soya Milk: Kinda meh taste for hot and cold beverages. U won’t go wrong with it. However, this ain’t the best product for all uses. U can make tofu tho, which is nice.
- Oat milk: The best choice for cold beverages. Oat milk has a flavor that is just much better than soy milk in my opinion. While u can use it for hot beverages (and it’s delicious there), u need to be kinda careful. The more u heat up oat milk, the thicker it becomes due to the starch present in it. Therefore, never try to boil, or come close to boiling oat milk ever.
- Coconut milk: If u have anything to say about coconut milk, gtfo from here. It’s fatty and can be a substitute for cream. Needless to say, it is absolutely delicious! South Indian curries make use of this. There’s also a drink that I love called “Solkadhi”, which is an Indian drink made using coconut milk. U just can’t talk smack abt it…
- Chickpea milk: Now this is a use case which I don’t know if many people would agree with me out on or no. What I do is, I make chickpea milk to make youghurt out of it (just ferment it using soaking water). Now, in my experience, this yogurt tastes like shit if u consume it alone. HOWEVER, if you use it in curries, gohdddd r u in for the treat of ur lifetime! One, u get a beautiful thick curry and two, u get that amazing acidic flavor. It’s just rlly rlly good! Highly recommend if u guys haven’t tried this out yet.
- Other plant milks: There are a gazillion other plant milks. I just mentioned the ones above that I have personal experience with.
In conclusion, try not to fixate on one plant milk alternative and then attempt to use it for all use cases of dairy milk. Remember, there is no monolithic “dairy milk alternative”. Different plant milks serve different purposes. If used correctly, u’ll get the best culinary experience of ur life!
Or, you know, I could just use milk.
Well sure… The reason why I don’t use dairy milk is because:
- lactose intolerance
- plant based milk is much better for the environment
- DIY plant based milk is cheap af
- Ethical concerns with the animal husbandry industry
Oatmilk creamer in coffee or chai, however, is delicious. Some brands are better tasting than others.
Are there actual studies showing that plant-based alternatives are better for health (for individuals that digest lactose just fine like me) ?
I switched to alt-milks for ecological reason but media keep talking about the negative health effects of «ultra-transformed food», which alt-milk very much sounds like…
I can’t speak to health, but here’s some thoughts on the ecological reason.
All the studies (that I have found at least) look at global carbon emissions and land use in production of milk. This is an important distinction.
The US, for example, is the #2 milk producer in the world (arguably #1 if we’re only talking about cow milk). It’s also the #1 beef producer in the world. The US’s livestock methane footprint is barely a blip on the Global Warming Radar (6% of total methane from all sources). There are even ways to reduce the carbon footprint of cow milk further, but it’s important to note we are very much in the range where we could easily take action to fund offsets and make the dairy industry 100% carbon neutral in the US. You may not be from the US, and that’s not the point. The point is that a lot of European countries that consume milk are in the same boat, and countries that are not as efficient as that could be with some regulatory changes and technological improvements.
Flip-side. As others have said, alt-milks are a lot less “ultra-transformed” than you might think. It’s like calling chicken broth “ultra-transformed”. You could make your own oatmilk or almond milk. It’s not hard or “weird”. They’re just oats and water, or nuts and water.
Actually, found this quote about the health of milk. “if we’re looking at like the nutrient density versus cost, cow’s milk is always going to win”. TO BE CLEAR, the expert in this article is saying “plant-based milk is just fine”, and she agrees that some plant-based milks are comparable to cow milk if less balanced. She has a long explanation of “you really need to know what you plan to get out of milk”, pointing out that most plant milks are too low in protein, but that it doesn’t matter if you’re just using it to remove acidity from your coffee… but that for a vegan they’re just fine.
“if we’re looking at like the nutrient density versus cost
the cost is massively subsidized for the benefit of large ag businesses in small states
So we should cut off our nose to spite our face? My point is true in a vacuum, not just true subsidized. That a small number of large corrupt businesses fuck the little guys is not a good reason to kill them all.
As you admit, those subsidies benefit large ag businesses, who then sell their products for the same price that mom-and-pops farms do, pocketing the margins.
The piece that was left out is much of those subsidies are paid in taxes and fees that are charged to… the same industry. Ask any small-town cow or dairy farmer how he/she feels about feed subsidies. That particular subsidy is taxed to the farmer (almost like they do with alcohol) on the first-sale of the cattle/milk. It is one of the largest big ag subsidies, and it is used to punish meat and dairy farmers… and they still can afford to bring milk to your fridge at these prices.
So here’s a deal for you. We both go after big ag together for a less corrupt world. The side-effect is that the cost of dairy might go down.
also, milk is just bad for most people. some people need the high fat and protein content, but most of us, including children, would be much better off not drinking milk at all.
Low fat milk has existed for decades, plus doesn’t modern research support the idea that carbs are worse than fat? And I don’t understand why protein is bad, unless you are eating only protein.
Milk is actually very good for children, just because it replaces other liquids that are worse and it has calcium and vitamin D.
https://health.clevelandclinic.org/dont-forget-dairy-part-childs-healthy-diet/
It sounds like you just don’t like natural milk.
First of all, I fucking love milk, you do not fucking know me.
Second of all, you really want to get in a battle of links?? https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/dairy-health-food-or-health-risk-2019012515849
Like an estimated two-thirds of the world’s population, I don’t digest lactose well,
That number, like all world population numbers is heavily skewed by just how many people are in China. The mutation that causes adults to continue to produce the enzyme to digest lactose is less common among those of Asian descent.
(Globally, alt-milks aren’t new on the scene—coconut milk is even mentioned in the Sanskrit epic Mahābhārata, which is thousands of years old.)
…and there are medieval European recipes that call for almond milk, and tofu is made from soy milk and there are written sources referencing it roughly a thousand years old. You’re right, none of these are really new on the scene, aside from maybe oat milk.
A 2021 report by industry analysts Mintec Limited and Frost Procurement Adventurer also notes that, while the inputs for dairy (such as cattle feed) for dairy are a little more expensive than typical plant-milk ingredients, plant alternatives face higher manufacturing costs.
I feel like your first paragraph completely ignored this aspect. You squeeze milk out of a cow. Nut and bean milks require grinding the stuff up with a lot of water, mixing it thoroughly, then squeezing the wet pulp through a fine filter (for small batches something like a cheesecloth) to separate the milk from the pulp.
Commercial oat milk requires further processing, because just pulping, mixing with water and straining oats does not produce anything appetizing at all.
In the United States, meanwhile, it’s a waiting game to see whether the government or corporations drive down alt-milk costs. Currently, Sumner says, plant-based milk producers operate under an assumption that “price isn’t the main thing” for their buyers—as long as enough privileged consumers will pay up, alt-milk can fill a premium niche. But it’s going to take a bigger market than that to make real progress in curbing emissions from food.
That’s not a bad assumption on their part - people who are deeply concerned with the emissions involved in producing their food tend to be richer, in no small part because poor folks are going to put price first, because they have to think about how food fits into their budget more.
Also cheese - you can’t make cheese from plant milks. Well, you can try, but that’s basically how you make tofu, and performing a similar process on other plant milks creates something closer to tofu than cheese.
Hey, just so you know, that whole lactose intolerance is just hundreds of years of the west drinking milk a lot.
And you can make cheese without milk. Obviously with a different process but Gouda is one of the cheeses that is already replicated very well.Oat milk does not need much processing btw. You can make really good tasting oatmilk at home.
Because the fiction that plant-based products are healthy has been heavily debunked by just how sickly vegans are on average?
by just how sickly vegans are on average?
???
