Have you seen the price of milk lately? Of course, you have, though as prices shoot to the moon it gets harder to read the stickers. Soaring inflation, even though our dear leader tells us it’s only 8%. Only. What jokers.
Now more than ever we cannot afford to let milk go to waste. Not as it becomes liquid gold.
I never used to have milk go to waste. With five children at home, plus their friends always coming over for afternoon cookies and milk, those gallon jugs were in constant rotation. Now, well, I’ve cut back on how much I buy with only one child at home full-time, but I still sometimes buy too much. And it spoils.
I don’t sweat bullets or cry over it, because there are so many ways to use spoiled milk that it never goes to waste. However, it is still taking up valuable real estate in the refrigerator, so I don’t really want to have all that much spoiled milk on hand.
There are several things you and I can do to keep milk fresh longer. The first several ideas are the common ones that get repeated ad nauseum around the internet and are only repeated here to refresh your memory:
- Keep milk refrigerated. Don’t let it sit on the counter. The temperature swings facilitate more rapid bacterial growth.
- Store milk on a lower shelf of the refrigerator, not on the door. Temperature swings are greater on the door than deeper inside the refrigerator.
- Shop for milk last when grocery shopping to minimize its exposure to warmer temperatures.
- Transfer milk to canning jars when you get home. Because it is denser, glass retains the cold longer than plastic or waxed cartons, so the milk isn’t subjected to the temperature swings that occur with other containers.
- Don’t let anyone drink from the carton or jug. That just introduces bacteria from the mouth into the container.
- Likewise, don’t pour milk back into the container, even if nobody drank from the cup. That will also introduce bacteria into the container.
Now for the less common ones, one based in folklore (but with modern research to support the idea), as well as two others that are totally actionable (and less objectionable) today.
- Apparently, Russian peasants would keep a frog, specifically a Russian brown frog, in the milk jug to prevent milk from spoiling. I could find no actual source for this practice; however, there were numerous mentions of the tradition. What I did come across were references to research projects showing that frog skins exude natural antibacterials and antifungals. If you are considering this approach to keeping your milk fresh when the refrigerator quits working, keep in mind that this study was conducted with Russian brown frogs, a subspecies of the common frog related to frogs we have here. We don’t actually have the actual species that the Russians used, so our results may differ. Even if we did have the right subspecies, the only decent thing to do would be to leave the frogs to be used by your friends and neighbors to keep their milk fresh.
- Adding ½-1 teaspoon of baking soda to a gallon of milk when you bring it home from the store will extend the shelf life of fresh milk up to one week.
- Likewise, adding a pinch of salt to a gallon of milk when you bring it home from the store will also extend the shelf life of fresh milk up to one week.
References:
https://gizmodo.com/how-to-keep-milk-from-spoiling-without-refrigeration-1566987047
https://phys.org/news/2012-12-frog-in-bucket-of-milk-folklore-potential-antibiotics.html
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/pr300890m
https://animalia.bio/rana-temporaria-temporaria
it's the Brown Frog that is involved in the Russian milk folklore >>> and it's more than just folklore - https://phys.org/news/2012-12-frog-in-bucket-of-milk-folklore-potential-antibiotics.html#:~:text=Frog-in-bucket-of-milk%20folklore%20leads%20to%20potential%20new%20antibiotics%20by,in%20the%20skin%20of%20the%20Russian%20Brown%20frog.
ReplyDeleteWe buy our milk by the gallon because it is cheaper, but its only one person drinking it, so I will pour half of it into smaller containers and freeze it.
ReplyDeleteI buy my milk in 1/2 gal waxed cardboard cartons. They cost a little more per gallon than the plastic jugs but the expiration date is 5-6 weeks out. I haven't had milk go bad at all since I made the switch. Like you, my kids are gone. I'm the only milk drinker - my husband hates store bought milk. It kills me to have to toss an almost full gallon that has gone bad because I can't use it up fast enough. This is the perfect solution since I only buy groceries about every 4-5 weeks.
ReplyDeleteThat is really interesting. I'm going to give it a try. Thanks so much for sharing.
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