I was in the middle of making dinner when this happened. I’m grateful I poured it into a measuring cup first. Thankfully I don’t live too far from another source.
I remember milk staying good almost a week past its expiration date when I was a kid. Boy have the times changed.
I’m baffled that America insists on selling milk by the gallon. That’s so much milk to finish after opening.
The maximum size we used to get while I was growing up where I live was 1 litre. Then came the big milk, 1.5 L. Now we have this even bigger one that’s 1.75 L, I think. Seems like it’s going to converge on 2 L. 😄
I go through a gallon of milk in 2-3 days and I live by myself. I’m a bodybuilder though so…
When I was a kid my family of four would go through a gallon a week.
Yeah that sounds about right
You can buy it in half gallons and quarts, too, but a lot of families go through a gallon in a couple days.
Kids drink lots of milk i used to think people who bought multiple gallons was crazy…
Now I’m at the point we use a gallon in about a 2 days…
I have two kids, and I drink milk as well. The three of us that drink milk in the household might finish a gallon or so during a week. Maybe a gallon and a half.
I still maintain that a gallon is a lot for one person though. But sure, people will have their anecdotes about consuming lots of milk. 👍
In the UK we have (in UK pints, 1 pint = 568ml): 1 pint, 2 pints, 4 pints and 6 pints. We also have slightly smaller metric sizes (1L, 2L) that are typically seen in convenience stores or on branded milk.
I would say that 4 pints (2.273L) is the typical size that most would buy for regular use, with smaller sizes popular for those that don’t have cereal/porridge. I find that milk from the supermarket tends to keep well, so it’s not that difficult to get through a 4 pinter, unless all you use it for is adding some in your tea - in which case you can just get a 1 or 2 pint jug.
We use it for drinking directly from a glass. Typically about 1 dl per children’s glass, 2 dl or so per adult glass. So do that once a day, that’s 2.8 litres a week for us. That makes 2×1.5 L/week enough. One gallon for one person is a lot of milk IMO but people obviously manage. I just find it baffling to consume that much. 😄
I used to go through 2gallons a week
Dairy is heavily subsidized in the US. 1 gallon (3.8L) barely costs more than 1/2. Might as well buy the whole gallon and turn what you aren’t going to otherwise use into yogurt or cheese.
I somehow doubt you can do much with pasteurized and homogenized 1% milk.
There’s a reason that most dairy products in Europe are made from raw milk.
Yogurt is super easy to make with any (dairy) milk.
There are some cheeses that are better with unpasteurized milk, but it still works with pasteurized milk. I think most cheeses made with unpasteurized milk are just done that way because the pasteurization is an unnecessary step. Cheeses that are aged long enough have the pathogens die off. In the US, that threshold is 60 days. In the EU, tradition is deemed more important than safety, so there is no waiting period. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12146498/#fsn370409-bib-0006
Homogenization is a challenge for curd formation with some cheeses, but you can counteract it with some extra calcium chloride.
It’s common to add cream to milk to boost the fat content for some cheeses.
You wouldn’t make rennet-based cheeses of the leftovers from a jug of milk, though, cause that’s not enough bang for your buck. I just make what’s essentially like a ricotta. All you have to do is heat it up, and add a little bit of distilled vinegar or lemon juice which cuddles it, and then you strain it through cheesecloth.
Amazing. Thanks for the info.
Any ideas on how I’d make dry cottage cheese out of it at home?
From what i understand “cottage cheese” is a cheese made from milk treated with rennet, lightly strained, and mixed with a little bit of cream. I’m sure there’s regional variation in the terminology and process.
From like 2 minutes of searching online, I seems like what people call “dry cottage cheese” is basically just what I described. Heat milk, acidify it, and strain. Typically what I do is strain it with a cloth until it’s fairly dry, then I’ll mix back in some of the whey until I get the texture I like.
The fancier version involves fermentation with bacterial cultures to create the necessary acid, but that’s not something you are going to do with a half jug of milk you want to just use up before it goes bad.
I can go through a whole gallon by myself before it goes bad. Now, I might just barely be able to do it most times, but still. Between cooking, drinking, and cereal, I can usually find a way to use it all. I mostly drink it though.