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The Constituents Of Milk

Have you had your quota of calcium, phosphorus, potassium, sodium, sulphur, aluminium, copper, iodine, manganese, zinc, albumin, globulin, casein, vitamins, amino acids and lactose for the morning? In simpler words, have you had your morning glass of milk?

Most milk is composed of 80 to 90 per cent water. The remaining 10 per cent consists of an abundance of the major nutrients needed by the body for good health, including fats, carbohydrates, proteins, minerals, and vitamins.

Milk gets its characteristic taste and texture owing to its fat content. Milk fat contains vitamin A, vitamin D, vitamin E and vitamin K, as well as certain fatty acids, which our body needs but cannot produce on its own. If you happen to consume milk without adding any sweetener to it, you will still find that it has a natural sweet taste. This is due to the presence of lactose, a sugar found only in milk. Lactose is a carbohydrate, which when broken down by the body supplies energy.

Casein a complete protein, which contains all the essential amino acids that the body cannot manufacture on its own, is present in milk. Other proteins present in milk include albumin and globulin. Milk is considered to be the best dietary source of calcium.

When milk is left undisturbed for a while, a layer of cream forms at the top. This is because the fat present in milk is light and therefore rises to the top. When cream is separated from milk on a large scale for commercial purposes, it is placed in a machine called a centrifuge. The spinning movement of the centrifuge results in the separation of fat from milk.

Different amounts of fat are removed to produce different qualities of milk like whole milk, skimmed or non-fat milk and low fat milk. When the fat content is lowered to 3.25 per cent, the milk is sold as whole milk. Low-fat milk contains one to two percent of fat, whereas, skimmed milk is the liquid that remains after removing all the cream; it contains about half a per cent milk fat.

The safest milk to use is milk that has been homogenized and pasteurized. Homogenization is a process, which gives milk an even composition, by distributing the globules of fat evenly through the milk. This is done by forcing hot milk under high pressure through small nozzles. In the other process, pasteurization, process milk is heated to a high temperature and is maintained at that temperature for a specific length of time. This ensures that harmful pathogens if any, are destroyed and the milk becomes safe for consumption.

Almost all milk is subjected to the process of pasteurization. Pasteurized milk can be stored in a refrigerator for a week or longer. Ultra pasteurized milk, common in Europe and Canada, is heated to an even higher temperature and can be stored at room temperature for several weeks.

Nature has designed the composition of human milk in such a way that it fulfils the nutritional requirements of an infant. Besides being nutritionally beneficial, human milk contains antibodies, which help in fighting off infections and diseases.

WiseDude.com Constituents of Milk

The Constituents Of Milk

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Constituents of Milk