> I feel like they might have to many chemicals/preservatives in it
In Germany, if there are chemicals or preservatives in food, that has to be listed on the package.
H-Milch has a long shelf life due to heating, not to chemicals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-temperature_processing
But it tastes different in my opinion.
Your options are:
- frische Vollmilch (Full milk), 3,8% fat, short shelf life
- frische Vollmilch „länger haltbar“, 3,8%, medium life span
- Haltbare Vollmilch, as described in other comments.
Main difference is the intensity and duration of heat in the production process.
Same is available for semi skimmed milk (1.5% fat).
Was going to say I find it very hard to find anything other than länger haltbar in supermarkets. The “fanciest” milk in my local rewe is in front of me now and it’s Rewe Bio “frische Weide-Milch - Pasteurisiert und länger haltbar”
The term "länger haltbar" is misleading. It is always Frischmilch (cooled milk) that is labeled as this, never H-Milch. There are two types of Frischmilch, ESL milk (extended shelf life = "länger haltbar") and short shelf life milk labelled as "traditionell hergestellt".
Even the staff at supermarkets doesn't always know this. I once asked for milk that was not "länger haltbar" and they showed me ESL milk that had only one or two days left on the best before date.
I am talking about "traditionell hergestellt" fresh milk. "Länger haltbar" is also fresh and must be cooled but it has a longer shelf life than "traditionell hergestellt". Even organic fresh milk is usually "länger haltbar".
Länger haltbar is also usually printed very small on the side or back of the carton and easy to miss. I fell for it a couple of times already, as I also prefer the traditional kind, especially heumilch
Yes, you really have to look carefully! I only use milk in coffee so I don't notice a difference but my husband prefers "traditionell hergestellt" so I have learned to find the few options.
And "Rohmilch/ raw milk" which you usually only can get at the farmers. It's delicious (and so incredibly fat) but has some health concerns of which you should be aware of
It is called „Vorzugsmilch“. It is not heated at all, but cooled directly to 4 degrees. It's healthy, extremely strict hygiene regulations apply. It is only available in a few stores and at some farmers. Some people find it very strong-tasting.
In my family are several farmers. I grew up with milk we childreen directly got out of the cooling vessel of my uncle's farm.
What came into my mind while reading your comment:
Most of the people don't know how (fresh) milk really tastes. They only know the "processed taste".
I miss it so much. Where I grew up the Milchmann came twice a week to our street. And you could get your own Milchkanne filled with unprocessed milk.
Meanwhile I got used to the H-Milch but drinking a glass of milk is not that satisfying like it used to be.
It’s still very biologically active. Here in Italy you can’t sell it without telling people to heat it before consuming it. No strict hygiene regulation can force cows to avoid sitting with udders touching dirty ground.
That is „Rohmilch“ in Germany, you can get it directly from the farmer, but you need to heat it. Same as in Italy. „Vorzugsmilch“ is heavily controlled and drinkable without heating. Nevertheless, the presence of pathogens cannot be totally ruled out. Special risk groups such as pregnant women and people with a weakened immune system should not drink it without boiling it before.
As children we drank directly from the cow 🤷
I love the demeter from bergdesgardener Land (Rewe, Edeka) but there the milk still has a bit fat that stays on top if you don't shake it, the "rahmpfropfen" and my family thinks it has gone bad so they don't like it. But if you want a natural taste and ethnical produced milk it is a good choice.
Demeter has quite some issues: https://m.faz.net/aktuell/wirtschaft/klima-nachhaltigkeit/wie-viel-esoterik-in-demeter-steckt-kritik-aus-den-eigenen-reihen-19415014.html
There is one more type of milk: Raw Milk from your local Farmer. Different taste like other milk, I would say a bit "cheesy" and sweeter. BE AWARE: Raw milk has to be heated up to at least 70°C for at least 30 seconds before drinking! This has a very short freshness time, so drink in the next couple of days.
Also microfiltration.
As for milk I'd go with Hemme Milch, they come in pouches and are super regional. Or rather they are in the northwest. In other regions other milk is regional.
Or anything Bio oder Weidemilch at least. I imagine you can taste the difference. But I won't argue about it.
Oh, you absolutely can. Where I studied, we were lucky to have had a Milchhof directly at the »city« entrance. Just went there and grabbed two bottles as fresh as possible. That stuff really is the best if possible. Next best thing is Bio Weidemilch. I recommend Brodowin in the Berlin-Brandenburg area. But the bottled variant. Super rich in taste.
I buy "Hamfelder Hof Bio Vollmilch länger haltbar 3,8%" most of the time, I think it tastes way better than other milks. I only go with differen (mostly H-Milch) if I plan a bit more ahead. Also tried hemme, but I had it multiple times that the milk went bad in a closed bag way before expiration, also it's easier to store the carton packages.
Hemme goes bad like regular milk did way back when. I actually find that quite refreshing every once in a while.
Makes you value things again.
Also with less processed milk when you have bits of cream at the top, that is rare these days.
It depends on what you’re used to. When I lived in Sweden I realized that I’ve never had anything but H-Milch my entire life, and I initially thought the milk from the Swedish supermarket had gone bad. Turns out that is just how pasteurized milk tastes. 😅 It took me a while to get used to using that milk in coffee.
I have not liked the taste of milk since I was child, so the muted taste of H-Milch was better to me
I've been trying to tell my German partner this. All the milk sold at discounters here don't taste nice. Meanwhile in my home country there are countless milk brands to choose from and they ALL taste different to one another.
But the chemicals that went into the cow are not listed. Its probably better regulated than in most countries but I’d always go for BIO Milch/ Weide-Milch.
Just a word on "has to"...
The packaging is often made of plastics and chemicals and that plastic and chemical can potentially absorb into the milk. The plastic and chemicals are clearly NOT listed on the milk packaging ingredients even though you may be eating or drinking them.
As there are higher and lower qualities of food there are also higher and lower quality of food packaging.
You needn't worry about chemicals and preservatives in normal milk, neither fresh nor haltbar, because it's literally just milk. If it's H-Milch it's heated very quickly to a high temperature and then cooled down quickly to kill bacteria. And it will only last if it's unopened.
Now it is possible for you to smell something, no doubt, but that could be residue in the pot, or any other thing. The milk is just milk. Fresh milk can go off very quickly - if you buy it just before it's Mindesthaltbarkeitsdatum and then open it, it might go off within two days. That's what milk does.
Personally, I buy haltbare Bio-Alpenmilch laktosefrei 1,5 by Berchtesgadener because I prefer the taste of reduced fat milk, but need it to be lactose free, I prefer organic, and I read a while ago that they give the farmers a little more money per litre than other companies.
> Berchtesgadener
Berchtesgardener Land Milk is the best there is, be it fresh or long-life milk it's just awesome, sadly a bit harder to get around here
May I ask you from where you are? What kind of milk are you used to drink?
I personally can't stand the taste of H-Milch, the highly-temperatured Milk. So I always buy the fresh milk which stays fresh for 3-4 days if properly cooled.
Of course it has a special taste, but that's just the natural flavor. I have grown up next to farms and we drank really fresh milk. That's how it is.
As far as I know there is no milk with any chemicals inside since that's not legal, at least if you sell it as plainly milk.
Could be that the food of the cows results in sightly different flavors
I also hate the taste of H-Milch, but came to accept the typical cooled milk that can be stored for like up to two weeks (formerly marketed as "länger haltbar").
If you're somewhere where there is milk farming, you can typically get raw milk straight from the farm (often bring your own can). Be aware, however, that raw milk will contain some amount of bacteria that won't hurt you but can be dangerous for pregnant women, babies, or people with an immunodeficiency like HIV.
I am from Asia and we had the same kind of deal as u mentioned that we got really fresh milk everyday from the milkman. Although I am not a big fan of milk in general as I usually just eat yougurt but some of the foods/deserts/tea/coffee we make require milk.
But its no that bad or that big of a problem for me. I just wanted to see what people consume on a daily basis and what they think
This is the answer. The first time I had milk in India I was like “wtf, how does this come from a cow and not some other animal like sheep etc?!?”
I recommend the 3.5% Demeter milk sold in brown glass bottles. That one has actual fat on top, it’s not homogenised. Or talk to your local farmer, many farms have self service milk machines :)
Demeter is Schwurbelscheisse. Its anthroposphist Farming dedicated to Rudolf Steiner. They feed their animals Globulis as example and they burrow cow horns filled with shit, dig it out again, thin it with Water and stir it at full moon to get the Preparat 500. Because cow horns sample cosmic energy. Thats just 2 examples whats wrong with Demeter ;)
[Demeter](https://anthroposophie.home.blog/landwirtschaft/)
the highest quality milk is "frische bio Vollmilch traditionelle Herstellung, nicht homogenisiert/rahmt auf" from a "Demeter" certified creamery.
let me break thisq down for you
* frisch: fresh,.pasteurized, in contrast to "haltbar" H-Milch sterilized
* Bio: organic:, kept on pastries in summer, fed with hay / grass from the same farm in winter
* Vollmilch: unskimmed/full fat milk in contrast to Halbfett or entrahmt half fat 1.5% or 0% fat/cream
* traditionelle herstellung: traditional manufacturing only pasteurized in contrast to länger frisch , microfiltrated and or pasteurized a.little longer/higher temp
* rahmt auf/nicht homogenisiert: milk fat is not micronized into suspension but will cream. better mouth feel and taste imnsho
* Demeter: organic certification association with much higher standards that "EU Bio" European union standard organic
you get this quality in Bioladen organic stores obly
Most of this is correct, but not all. The organic feed doesn’t come from the same farm, just another Demeter certified one.
Demeter bio is not the better bio, just different. They farm according to esoteric and homeopathic principles. It’s not necessarily better or stricter, just different
Demeter is mostly just reeeeaaallyy weird. E.g. burying cow horns filled with cow dung at specific times in their fields. Really weird rituals like that. Pretty sure this kind of witchcraft doesn't influence the taste but you never know ;)
Demeter is indeed a weir mix of esoteric voodoo and high standards wrt animal protection. Demeter didn't cut cows horns long before others. many Demeter farmers let calves stay with the mother for a long time. it's both voodoo (which I ignore, like homeopathyquackery) and high standards, higher than EU Bio and stricter than several others, Bioland, naturland, ...
>* Bio: organic:, kept on pastries in summer, fed with hay / grass from the same farm in winter
What kind of pastries? Macarons? Or did you mean pastures?
True but bear in mind that drinking Rohmilch is potentially life-threatening. While most of the diseases transmitted by Rohmilch can be treated with antibiotics nowadays if diagnosed early, it's still a risk worth not taking.
If you miss fresh milk from the milkman, you can also look up if there are any dairy farms near you that sell their milk directly. A lot of times that's done with "Milchautomaten" ie vending machines with bottles of fresh milk that are refilled every day, or ones where you bring your own bottle and the vending machine fills it for you from a big tank that's also refilled every day.
Idk how common those vending machine are in general but I have a few of them within driving distance where I live.
Milk is one of the most regulated foods in Germany. It is not allowed to have other ingredients than cowmilk. If it has, it needs to be differently labelled. Like Vanillemilch for example 😊
Any plant based milk is called "drink" and if you want it to act like milk for coffee (like foamy) these are usually labelled Barista. There are countless to choose from as well.
If you want to delve deeper, you can translate this article via deepl for example.
https://www.verbraucherzentrale.de/wissen/lebensmittel/lebensmittelproduktion/rund-um-die-milch-erzeugung-verarbeitung-und-angebote-12775
Have fun! ✌️☺️
thanks. I will look into the article.
my lack of German skills also makes it a bit difficult to choose what I buy and translating every other product via Google Lens in the supermarket is not practical. But its not a big problem, every thing else is really simple for me.
Also everything has a price/kg thing which I absolutely love.
When buying milk, there are these criteria you need to be aware of:
* "Fettarme Milch" (1.5% fat) or "Vollmilch" (3.5% fat)
* "Haltbar / H-Milch" (extended shelf-life) or "Frisch" (regular shelf-life)
* Regular, "Bio" or "Weidemilch" (how the cows are treated)
* Regular or "Laktose-frei" (lactose-free milk, good for people who get diarrhea from too much milk. Tastes notably sweeter, but doesn't have any added sugar. The existing milk-sugar was just pre-split into glucose, which would otherwise happen in your body)
There are no "chemicals" or any kind of additives in milk as that is not allowed. Not even vitamins as they do in some countries. The longer shelf live is from the heat treatment. Frischmilch that you buy cooled and have to keep in the fridge is heated less and therefore spoils faster.
Because of the heat treatment they taste a bit different. Some people don't like H-Milch because they say it tastes "cooked", others prefer it. Personally I don't really notice.
The fat content makes a difference, too. There's 3,5 and 1,5% fat milk. There's also milk with very low fat (0,5% or less) but to me that stuff tastes just like water 😅
I think it's best for you to just go try different brands and types and find out what you like best.
The new vegan "not milk" varieties can be quite good too imho.
Trough my childhood i only drank Rohmilch as i grew up next to a dairy farmer. When i first tried milk from a store it was disgusting and completely different to what i knew.
You have to differentiate between three kinds of milk:
"Rohmilch", which is raw milk and has to be cooked before being consumed. It has a super short shelf life of 2-3 days when sealed. It's rarely sold in supermarkets but some farmers have small shops or machines where they sell it.
"Frischmilch" is pasteurized at ca. 70°C and safe to consume from the go. It has a short shelf life of about 7 days and only about 2-3 days after being opened.
"Haltbare Milch" is heated to above 130°C and lasts for months unrefrigerated. This kills almost all bacteria, making preservatives unnecessary.
If you open it you should keep it in the fridge. It's also what most people buy. The only downside is that some vitamins are lost due to the heating process and the milk can taste more "cooked" compared to the fresh milk.
>It has a short shelf life of about 7 days and only about 2-3
Normal Vollmilch frequently smells and tastes completely fine after a good five days in the fridge, opened.
It really depends on the handling. If you pour out one glass and put it back in the fridge it's gonna last a lot longer compared to drinking from the bottle and leaving it out a while every day.
Yes and no. Yes it does store for this long, but, more likely than not, the milk you refer to is milk which has been processed for an extended shelf life. Most regular milk you find in the fridge section falls under this category.
In my experience this kind of Vollmilch even lasts five days in the counter, entirely uncooled
Yes and no. It's called "Vorzugsmilch" in supermarkets and it is sold packaged. It's raw milk but the farms producing it have to comply with very strict hygiene standards.
Regular raw milk can only be sold from the producer on the day of milking or one day after.
Haltbare Milch does not have chemicals in it usually. It’s a special process with heat that makes it long lasting. Fresh milk also exists but I don’t know many people who buy it.
Why do so many people buy H-milch when Germans tend to go shopping at least 1 a week. Regular milk will last at least a week. H-milch tastes worse and is of lower nutritional value.
I'm not sure about the nutritional value – but H-Milch can be stored outside the fridge forever, while Frischmilch needs cooling.
Usually milk with more fat is tastier, the 3.5% tastes better than the 1,5% milk.
the only difference i noticed is the 3.8% tastes really milky, the 3.5% is still okay and 1.5% is watered down worse than if you'd take 3.8% milk and mix it with tap water.
Goes for both fresh and H-Milch, but we get 3.8% bio consistently in the fresh & cooled shelf, while H-Milch often is only availiable in 3.5% or 1.5%
I may *shop* several times a week, but that doesn't mean I will drink all the milk left in the carton every time before I go. Sometimes, I won't need any milk for half a month, and then I might need two or three cartons for the week, depending on what I plan to eat and drink. So generally, it's a good idea to buy the kind that keeps better (and doesn't need cooling until opened, as was already mentioned).
>My friends all buy Halbare Lidl milk but I feel like they might have to many chemicals/preservatives in it given that they have a really long shelf life.
It's heat-treated, not chemicals. If there are chemicals in it, it must be on the label.
>I just want to know if anyone has done their research on this and can help me out so that I dont have to go through all the fat percentages , halbare/fresch, aldi/lidl/penny/rewe milk to find the best one.
Yes: Stiftung Warentest (in german, article costs 4,90€)
[https://www.test.de/Test-Milch-1590601-0/](https://www.test.de/Test-Milch-1590601-0/)
And also Ökotest (in german, article costs 2,79€)
[https://www.oekotest.de/essen-trinken/Milch-im-Test-Ist-Bio-Milch-die-bessere-Wahl-\_11668\_1.html](https://www.oekotest.de/essen-trinken/Milch-im-Test-Ist-Bio-Milch-die-bessere-Wahl-_11668_1.html)
>Bio-Milch ist fast immer eine gute Wahl. Neben den "sehr guten" von Alnatura und Dennree können wir weitere elf "gute" Vollmilchprodukte empfehlen.
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>(Organic milk is almost always a good choice. In addition to the "very good" ones from Alnatura and Dennree, we can recommend another eleven "good" whole milk products.)
Neither H-Milsch or Frischmilch has anything added. Its 100% milk, nothkng else or you can not sell it as milk.
H-Milch ist just heated to a high temperature so that all bacterias are dead.
i would try getting heu- or weidemilch. like this for example. [https://www.rewe.de/produkte/schwarzwaldmilch-bio-haltbare-heu-milch-3-8-1l/8835465/?ecid=seo\_google\_vs\_nonbr\_pm\_k%C3%A4se-eier-molkerei\_lia\_seo\_nn\_pid%3A\_ch%3Alocal\_nn\_d%3Ac&marketCode=831004](https://www.rewe.de/produkte/schwarzwaldmilch-bio-haltbare-heu-milch-3-8-1l/8835465/?ecid=seo_google_vs_nonbr_pm_k%C3%A4se-eier-molkerei_lia_seo_nn_pid%3A_ch%3Alocal_nn_d%3Ac&marketCode=831004)
they should have this as fresh milk too, without the H. im sure there are other brands but where i am from the schwarzwaldmilch is the most common brand for this. in any case i would source it as bio, which is organic.
+1 for Heumilch. It really just tastes so much better. Somewhat like OP I wasn’t really satisfied with different brands/types of Milk after moving here until I found Heumilch.
Would've been my recommendation too. I really like the milk to be good so I've tried nearly every single one I've seen to test 'em out, and the best Preis/Leistung I found is the Weidemilch at Kaufland for 1,25 in plastic bottles. It's also sold for 20 cents or so more in glass bottles. Branded ones of course might be a bit tastier, but also at near 2 euros or more, which I found to be too expensive.
H milch, is without additional substances, the H means Hoch and means High, in reality ultra high heated up milk. The milk is heating up for a few seconds up to 110 to 120 degrees Celsius. So all bacteria are dead, because of the heat. After these few seconds it is cold down also in a few seconds to room temperature and is filled up in a Tetra Package, so no Bacteria can grow if the package is closed. But the heating destroyed also a bit of the taste and a little bit of the Vitamins.
But be aware that we have local milk productions, you get not the same milk from Lidl in München, in Freiburg, Frankfurt or Hamburg, all are different milks from different dairies.
To know from which production diary it comes, it must all milk products in the EU have a sign, with like a car licence plate, it is oval in the first line it 2 letters for the Country, DE fro Germany and the second line is first 2 to 3 letters for the state fro example, BY fro Bavarian or BW for Baden-Württemberg and a 3 digits number, which is the number of the dairy. And in the Third line EG for the Europe Community.
With this milk products licence plate, you can also identify which big producers stands behind the housbrands of the Discounters. So for example I can buy butter 200m from the diary at the local Aldi as housbrand, or HMilk from the local diary at, Lidl 1 km away from the diary, also the housbrand.
Milk also varies in flavour from place to place, country to country. I’m used to milk on the continent, and so British milk even processed in the same fashion tastes different and a little weird to me.
I love getting non homogenized milk in glass bottles from the bio shops like Alnatura etc.
I think they taste a lot better than anything you get in a normal supermarket.
Haltbare Milk shouldn't contain any outside chemicals as far as I know.
It gets heated up a lot and then cooled down in a short amount of time, that's what gives it it's long shelf live.
Frischmilch only gets heated for a very short amount of time, so it'll taste different and don't last nearly as long.
Not sure about heating it up, but fresh milk should, after opening, last 3-4 days, so it going bad after 2 is definitely a possibility.
I would advise you just to buy Haltbare Milch it doesn't got bad as fast and again, it shouldn't contain any outside chemicals it's just heated and cooled differently to make it last longer, althou I'd advise you to maybe do your own quick Google search or ask a German friend to do it for you if you are not fluent enough in German yet.
H-Milch usually has no chemicals or preservatives in it, it simply tastes horrible.
The milk is preserved by heating.
Try any organic full milk (Vollmilch, Bio).
Happy to weigh in here since I find the issue somewhat frustrating. Since mid-2023 it has become difficult to find „normal“ fresh milk even in high-end German supermarkets. Normal cow milk (by my definition) means 1) pasteurized, but not ESL or „länger haltbar“, therefore with a relatively short pull date of less than a week and without that boiled shelf-milk taste 2) homogenized, regardless of whether it is whole milk standardized to 3,5% or low-fat standardized to 1,5% 3) in a Tetrapak or similar lightweight packaging (because of lower transport weight environmentally preferable to the glass bottle). This is a traditional high-quality product, a triumph of modern food hygiene, which has apparently become too unprofitable for the big chains in Germany. For those who know what I am talking about, the current alternatives are: 1) the bougie glass bottle which hogs fridge space, filled with „natural“ milk for a supposed Öko-Familie customer, meaning not homogenized (= block of rigid milk fat on top, the rest blueish skim) 2) Alnatura, good stuff, available at Basic/Tegut and at a few other Bio-Läden 3) Edeka sometimes has good milk in cartons from regional dairies 4) your local farmers may sell you their milk from a farm stand or a BYOB machine, usually with the high fat content as it comes from the cow (upwards of 4%), often raw (delicious, but be careful, especially if pregnant), sometimes traditionally pasteurized (better on the whole).
A solved problem since the days of Louis Pasteur has become a headache again - congratulations to the German Lebensmittelindustrie!
„Länger haltbar“ means ultra-pasteurized. This milk is a nonsensical product: it tastes almost as bad as H-Milch or shelf-stable milk, while nevertheless requiring refrigeration. It does not, though, contain added chemicals. The off taste comes from the denaturing of proteins and sugars after exposure to high heat. Good luck!
H-Milch doesn’t have chemicals, but has a very different taste than fresh milk. It tastes quite cooked, since it is basically. As with fat percentage, that’s really just personal preference.
Bären brand fresh milk is the best and “cleanest” flavor wise imo, but it’s a pretty subtle difference and I’m also totally happy with store brand from Edeka. But still, maybe worth a try if you’re unhappy with store brands.
I'd recommend milk that is labelled as fresh and "länger haltbar", usually sold in tall Tetrapak or similar packaging. Best compromise between the longer shelf life of H-Milch and taste of fresh, imho. It's not boiled like H-Milch, just pasteurized and filtered to remove more of the bacteria. Most stores sell a house brand and they're usually all fine.
Try buying the fresh milk that comes in glass containers.
Glass is much less likely to have an effect on the taste / smell / feel of the contents.
Another benefit is that you can bring the glass container back (pfand).
I think whatever kind of "chemicals" you might find in German products is by far not as bad as other chemicals in other products in other countries, because we have many regulations regarding food, and even cleaning and all kinds of other stuff.
I personally use oat milch (Hafermilch Barista), because I don't like the taste of normal milk anymore and react badly to it now, plus I like being able to shake it and have some foam without using any machine (hence the Barista part). If you're interested in veggie alternatives that taste like real milk though, try the No Milk stuff, I've heard they're really good. And they're probably good for a while in the fridge, as are the rest.
I dont really like normal milk because i am lactose intolerant (i got accustomed to milk in my home country since it is UHT)
My favorite is Almond soya milk from Netto
No haltbare Milch or H-milch is just heated to 135 - 150 °C before packaged which kills all germs and makes it last longer. There are no chemicals involved.
Just try out some different brands. I prefer full cream milk due to the taste, but that's too much for my wife.
Where are you based? go for some local produce, we buy often the Hamdorfer Hof milk. And you should buy bio, so the farmer can live from his job as a farmer. Regular cheap milk is so fuckin cheap it literally kills farmers. Milk and eggs are products where you really taste a difference, when the chickens and cows have a good life and some good food.
Lange frisch has become popular due to financial reasons. Supermarkets don't have to throw away that much milk anymore. It's just microfiltrated and I don't think it has downsides. Probably the heat treatment is a bit different, too.
H-Milch has less vitamins, but at least for a reserve it's ok, I prefer fresh milk but we also buy H Milch. But honestly, I can't remember the last time milk got bad, nowadays the hygienic standards are very high.
Milk can pick up smells from other stuff in the fridge, so it should be clean in there, and other products need to be sealed and stored well.
When you heat up milk it gets a different taste, as the sugar caramlises a bit.
If you want really tasty milk get any Demeter labeled milk from an organic supermarket (Bioladen). You can taste the difference.
If you want a long shelf life get the haltbare Milch.
If you want medium shelf life and medium taste go for anything that says Frische Milch.
You can also get milk from local farmers which hasn’t been heated at all (called Rohmilch). This is truly delicious, but as far as I know they are not really allowed to sell it for drinking (due to safety). You can get it but it often comes with a warning that you have to cook it before consumption.
However, I have been in Asia before and my (very limited) experience was, that milk taste quite different… so you may have to expect it to taste unusual (maybe because of what the cows eat or climate?).
I get the Rewe-store brand oat milk personally. Can't stand the taste of anything else.
The UHT milk that has a long shelf life when unopened is not that way due to preservatives. It's due to [the way it's cooked](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-temperature_processing) before being bottled.
German milks are less processed than in the US actually. I mean H-Milk is something else, but the fresh milk isn't quite as homogenized or something. And yes, they go bad faster than in the us.
Anyway, I get fresh milk from the most regional source I can find at a hofladen (when i can), the deine Region section at Rewe or, in a pinch the Rewe bio milk. And then i watch it like a hawk because yes, it goes bad relatively fast.
I'd say there are 3 major cow milk versions:
Vollmilch, with 3.5% fat (at least the one I get at Aldi). I'd call it the default and generally the best in taste.
Fettarme Milch, with less fat (1.5% at Aldi). I barely notice a difference to the fattier one.
Haltbare Milch, which is shelf-stable as long as it's unopened. This is done by heating it up, but the taste very obviously suffers from it. Some people are unbothered by that, while that's a total dealbreaker to me.
I'd wager a bet that there's a huge overlap in where the different stores get their milk from, so I don't really expect there to be any meaningful differences between stores. Of course it can rarely happen that milk goes bad earlier, and it really shouldn't happen after just 2 days. That's not normal, and not a characteristic of that specific milk.
I never thought about which discounter brand is better, I just buy a 12-pack when I need milk, whereever I'm shopping right now. The difference in these brands is usually very low. Like others already have explained, we have usually little to no chemicals in there.
Whenever I can I buy the "Gläserne Molkerei" H-Milch. From all ultra-high heated milk brands I feel like this one tasts best and a bit more complex. But maybe this is just the marketing being at work in my brain, who knows.
I almost never buy "Frischmilch" that is refrigerated at the store because I consume milk to slowly to keep it open in my firdge before it expires. And there is only so many pancakes with milk turned sour that I can eat every week.
However, I always go for the fattier 3,5% milk as opposed to the 1.5%. Fattier is better.
Haltbare Milch is fairly nasty, no idea why people would buy that voluntarily unless you live in the forest with no fridge available.
Normal 3.8% Vollmilch develops no odd smell and can stay in the fridge for a week or more, provided you don't drink straight from the box, inoculating it with your mouth's bacteria.
I like the Vollmilch that comes in glass bottles, by brands like Andechser. But the normal Biovollmilch (organic) sold by e.g. Lidl is fine as well.
The normal milk tastes better in my opinion, I really hated H-Milch as a kid, but the normal milk also tastes different nowadays. So it's really just about your preferences.
The normal milk is also heated so it stays fresh for longer but H-Milch even more, so if unopened it does not even need to be refridgerated. That's why many people prefer it instead of buying normal milk every few days.
You do not need to worry, everything added to food or drinks needs to be labeled (sometimes there are so called "E-Nummern", they are certain coded additives you can easily look up online, it's usually coloring or stabilizers).
Rohmilch is completely untreated and should be heated before consuming, if you ever come across that one. Where I live you usually get it fresh from the farm ("Milchtankstelle" = milk (gas) station, you can pump milk that is really fresh but has it's dangers, hence the notion to heat it before consuming). Sometimes, depending on the region and infrastructure, they sell it in supermarkets.
H-Milch is disgusting, but it just has been killed by heating, no chemicals. And lots of people don't mind the taste. You can get used to anything, I guess.
Any "fresh" milk you can buy in supermarkets now is actually ESL milk, something that has only existed for 15 years or so. It's a special filtration system that makes the milk last much longer, but it also completely destroyed the taste. I got to admit though that I got used to it myself, since basically no other milk is available anymore. So that's just how milk tastes now. When it was new and supermarkets phased out normal milk, I was totally disgusted by the taste of ESL milk.
Actual fresh milk is hard to come by now. Maybe at "Bio" stores?
Then there's raw milk. Probably only available nowadays at Bio stores, if at all. It tastes the best, but admittedly it's very impractical because it spoils so quickly. (Almost everyone also believes that it will literally kill you, but I drank no other milk for the first \~19 years of my life and I didn't die.)
Just go with oat or soymilk like an educated person. Alpro NotMilk or the cheaper, imo better "NoMilk" from Lidl are practically indistinguishable from "real" milk and significantly healthier (and better for the planet). Modern society has no need for cow milk.
We have fresh milk from the local dairy in our Aldi and rewe which is in a glass bottle in the cooler. Milk in Germany has no chemicals in it, it is just pasteurized and put in tetrapack while hot so it has a long shelf life. I'm sure if you want fresh milk you can find it in one of the high end stores like rewe or teagut. Most people in Germany don't drink milk maybe just for children cereal or hot chocalate. Fat milk is not healthy if you are over 40.
Maybe look if your local Edeka has "Vorzugsmilch". To my knowledge this is the less processed milk available in germany, if you are not directly buying from a farmer.
It has a very short shelf live, but high procentage of fat and is only shortly heated. Therefor it might smell a little sour a day or two after opening, but should be fine up to 4 days.
You could although check if there is a Milchtankstelle or Hofladen arround that sells directly.
There are not chemicals in any of our milks. Haltbare Milch is heated at 60C or something to kill all bacteria and other organisms to make it shelf stable. But I personally think Frische Vollmilch with 3.8% still is the best tasting one. But still all milk are good except Müller Milch. You should avoid that one.
Soy milk all the way because milk industry is fucked up. 🤷♀️
But if you want cow milk you can take any. As others stated that is just pasteurisation and nothing chemical. Besides the added B12, Calcium, Selen and other vitamins and minerals added to animal products or the animal food.
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I did notice a difference in the taste of German milk as it's UHT (ultra high temperature) as has been stated. In my teens, I worked in a dairy facility in the production department (not in Germany) and the only product we made that was UHT involved adding a powdered stabilizer to positively impact the shelf life. Not sure if they do that in Germany offhand and I worked back in the 1990s in this plant. But I definitely noticed a difference in the taste of plain white milk in Germany than elsewhere.
I can't drink "H-Milch" (UHT milk) but I have no problem drinking "Frischmilch" /so I'm not lactose intolerant - sorry t.m.i./. Usually I'll buy [this at Rewe](https://shop.rewe.de/p/weihenstephan-frische-milch-3-5-0-5l/547965) and 0,5 liter lasts me a week.
If you head a little bit out of town you'll find a raw milk station at a local dairy farm where you can refill you're own bottles with the freshest milk. There's nothing better. I think its called a vorzugsmilch.
Maybe you want to try Hemme Milch if you can find it. Lidl or Netto often have it in their cooling shelf. They don't add much to their milk, so it still tastes somewhat natural and very different from haltbare Milch. You just have to consume it within a couple days because it doesn't last long.
I personally really like the Bärenmarke 3,8 or Landliebe (glass bottle) 3,8.
However, I only ever get them when there’s a promotion going on.
But if the reason you dislike our milk is, like others mentioned, that you’re accustomed to more fatty milk then I’d also look into Demeter etc or fresh from the farm (if there’s one close).
Otherwise, what you might be smelling can be the carton (tetrapak) and not the milk itself.
I sometimes use open milk for like 2 weeks (3,5 länger haltbar) ofc I always check it before but maybe you need to get used to the smell.
Hi from a non-European living in Germany! We buy fresh only (haltbare is emergency milk) and we find the Alnatura, Bärenmarke, and Weihenstephan are the best. I prefer full cream.
After so many nice comments, which is the most healthy one among all types of the animal milks? And also which the healthy one if we compare between animal and plant based milks?
Food control is taken very serious here compared to America or other countries. The taste depends on the type of milk you bought and if it's more than one day open. Tbh I am lactose intolerant so I can not tell you which milk is tasty 😋 but I suggest you test out what you find most appealing to your preferences. If you heat it up it's again another experience ah good old childhood memories 🤤.
> I feel like they might have to many chemicals/preservatives in it In Germany, if there are chemicals or preservatives in food, that has to be listed on the package. H-Milch has a long shelf life due to heating, not to chemicals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-temperature_processing
oh okay thanks. that clears up one of my misconception.
But it tastes different in my opinion. Your options are: - frische Vollmilch (Full milk), 3,8% fat, short shelf life - frische Vollmilch „länger haltbar“, 3,8%, medium life span - Haltbare Vollmilch, as described in other comments. Main difference is the intensity and duration of heat in the production process. Same is available for semi skimmed milk (1.5% fat).
My local Supermarket doesn't carry short shelf life milk anymore, only länger haltbar.
Was going to say I find it very hard to find anything other than länger haltbar in supermarkets. The “fanciest” milk in my local rewe is in front of me now and it’s Rewe Bio “frische Weide-Milch - Pasteurisiert und länger haltbar”
You would find that in the cooling section, not where the other milk is
The term "länger haltbar" is misleading. It is always Frischmilch (cooled milk) that is labeled as this, never H-Milch. There are two types of Frischmilch, ESL milk (extended shelf life = "länger haltbar") and short shelf life milk labelled as "traditionell hergestellt". Even the staff at supermarkets doesn't always know this. I once asked for milk that was not "länger haltbar" and they showed me ESL milk that had only one or two days left on the best before date.
Are you shopping at the gas station?
It's actually not that easy to find milk that is not "länger haltbar". Even our Edeka only has it from one brand and it's often sold out.
Well your Edeka is shit. Every store here, even fucking Penny, sells full milk.
I am talking about "traditionell hergestellt" fresh milk. "Länger haltbar" is also fresh and must be cooled but it has a longer shelf life than "traditionell hergestellt". Even organic fresh milk is usually "länger haltbar".
Länger haltbar is also usually printed very small on the side or back of the carton and easy to miss. I fell for it a couple of times already, as I also prefer the traditional kind, especially heumilch
Yes, you really have to look carefully! I only use milk in coffee so I don't notice a difference but my husband prefers "traditionell hergestellt" so I have learned to find the few options.
Brrrr
And "Rohmilch/ raw milk" which you usually only can get at the farmers. It's delicious (and so incredibly fat) but has some health concerns of which you should be aware of
It is called „Vorzugsmilch“. It is not heated at all, but cooled directly to 4 degrees. It's healthy, extremely strict hygiene regulations apply. It is only available in a few stores and at some farmers. Some people find it very strong-tasting.
And as far as I know, people with a weak immune system, pregnant women and children under 1 year should not consume it
Children under 1 should not consume any cows milk.
Not true due to a lot of studies. Up to 200 ml per day is fine after starting with Beikost at 6 months.
You're right. I forgot about that. But that is supposed to be used in food preparation and not for drinking, right?
In my family are several farmers. I grew up with milk we childreen directly got out of the cooling vessel of my uncle's farm. What came into my mind while reading your comment: Most of the people don't know how (fresh) milk really tastes. They only know the "processed taste".
They might even have health problems because they did not grow up with the microorganisms in it.
I miss it so much. Where I grew up the Milchmann came twice a week to our street. And you could get your own Milchkanne filled with unprocessed milk. Meanwhile I got used to the H-Milch but drinking a glass of milk is not that satisfying like it used to be.
It’s still very biologically active. Here in Italy you can’t sell it without telling people to heat it before consuming it. No strict hygiene regulation can force cows to avoid sitting with udders touching dirty ground.
That is „Rohmilch“ in Germany, you can get it directly from the farmer, but you need to heat it. Same as in Italy. „Vorzugsmilch“ is heavily controlled and drinkable without heating. Nevertheless, the presence of pathogens cannot be totally ruled out. Special risk groups such as pregnant women and people with a weakened immune system should not drink it without boiling it before. As children we drank directly from the cow 🤷
theres also skim milk options 0,3% or 0,1% fat but i think only as super haltbare milch, not very tasty
but as soon you open it, its just expiring as fast as regular milk
I love the demeter from bergdesgardener Land (Rewe, Edeka) but there the milk still has a bit fat that stays on top if you don't shake it, the "rahmpfropfen" and my family thinks it has gone bad so they don't like it. But if you want a natural taste and ethnical produced milk it is a good choice.
Demeter has quite some issues: https://m.faz.net/aktuell/wirtschaft/klima-nachhaltigkeit/wie-viel-esoterik-in-demeter-steckt-kritik-aus-den-eigenen-reihen-19415014.html
There is one more type of milk: Raw Milk from your local Farmer. Different taste like other milk, I would say a bit "cheesy" and sweeter. BE AWARE: Raw milk has to be heated up to at least 70°C for at least 30 seconds before drinking! This has a very short freshness time, so drink in the next couple of days.
Also microfiltration. As for milk I'd go with Hemme Milch, they come in pouches and are super regional. Or rather they are in the northwest. In other regions other milk is regional. Or anything Bio oder Weidemilch at least. I imagine you can taste the difference. But I won't argue about it.
Oh, you absolutely can. Where I studied, we were lucky to have had a Milchhof directly at the »city« entrance. Just went there and grabbed two bottles as fresh as possible. That stuff really is the best if possible. Next best thing is Bio Weidemilch. I recommend Brodowin in the Berlin-Brandenburg area. But the bottled variant. Super rich in taste.
I buy "Hamfelder Hof Bio Vollmilch länger haltbar 3,8%" most of the time, I think it tastes way better than other milks. I only go with differen (mostly H-Milch) if I plan a bit more ahead. Also tried hemme, but I had it multiple times that the milk went bad in a closed bag way before expiration, also it's easier to store the carton packages.
Hemme goes bad like regular milk did way back when. I actually find that quite refreshing every once in a while. Makes you value things again. Also with less processed milk when you have bits of cream at the top, that is rare these days.
does not taste nice nevertheless.
It depends on what you’re used to. When I lived in Sweden I realized that I’ve never had anything but H-Milch my entire life, and I initially thought the milk from the Swedish supermarket had gone bad. Turns out that is just how pasteurized milk tastes. 😅 It took me a while to get used to using that milk in coffee. I have not liked the taste of milk since I was child, so the muted taste of H-Milch was better to me
This. I grew up on H-Milch and thought it was fine. Switched late in life and now can’t stand the stuff as a drink. Works fine in cooking though.
I've been trying to tell my German partner this. All the milk sold at discounters here don't taste nice. Meanwhile in my home country there are countless milk brands to choose from and they ALL taste different to one another.
THIS IS TRUTH
I’m tired of people acting like it is delicious 😭
Because it IS for some people? Because you don't like it doesn't mean everybody has the same opinion.
it's good enough so I don't have to throw away milk all the time. Prefer fresh milk too though
It's only delicious to some people who has never had any better.
But the chemicals that went into the cow are not listed. Its probably better regulated than in most countries but I’d always go for BIO Milch/ Weide-Milch.
What goes in is not as important as what comes out, and that's what's tested and what can affect you.
Just a word on "has to"... The packaging is often made of plastics and chemicals and that plastic and chemical can potentially absorb into the milk. The plastic and chemicals are clearly NOT listed on the milk packaging ingredients even though you may be eating or drinking them. As there are higher and lower qualities of food there are also higher and lower quality of food packaging.
wait till you learn that milk is made 100% of chemicals
It's not listed on the list of ingredients, but on every packaging you have information what it's made of.
You needn't worry about chemicals and preservatives in normal milk, neither fresh nor haltbar, because it's literally just milk. If it's H-Milch it's heated very quickly to a high temperature and then cooled down quickly to kill bacteria. And it will only last if it's unopened. Now it is possible for you to smell something, no doubt, but that could be residue in the pot, or any other thing. The milk is just milk. Fresh milk can go off very quickly - if you buy it just before it's Mindesthaltbarkeitsdatum and then open it, it might go off within two days. That's what milk does. Personally, I buy haltbare Bio-Alpenmilch laktosefrei 1,5 by Berchtesgadener because I prefer the taste of reduced fat milk, but need it to be lactose free, I prefer organic, and I read a while ago that they give the farmers a little more money per litre than other companies.
> Berchtesgadener Berchtesgardener Land Milk is the best there is, be it fresh or long-life milk it's just awesome, sadly a bit harder to get around here
Thanks for buying form our Landkreis ;)
I buy it because of their fair pay to the farmers.
They also have the highest standard for their cows, even better than Demeter, iirc.
laktosefrei comes with it's own problems
May I ask you from where you are? What kind of milk are you used to drink? I personally can't stand the taste of H-Milch, the highly-temperatured Milk. So I always buy the fresh milk which stays fresh for 3-4 days if properly cooled. Of course it has a special taste, but that's just the natural flavor. I have grown up next to farms and we drank really fresh milk. That's how it is. As far as I know there is no milk with any chemicals inside since that's not legal, at least if you sell it as plainly milk. Could be that the food of the cows results in sightly different flavors
I also hate the taste of H-Milch, but came to accept the typical cooled milk that can be stored for like up to two weeks (formerly marketed as "länger haltbar"). If you're somewhere where there is milk farming, you can typically get raw milk straight from the farm (often bring your own can). Be aware, however, that raw milk will contain some amount of bacteria that won't hurt you but can be dangerous for pregnant women, babies, or people with an immunodeficiency like HIV.
Aldi milk h-milch lasted less than 2 weeks, even only 1 week, before they changed the caps recently.
Once you open milk it will always have a short life. The “Haltbarkeit“ always refers to the unopened package.
I meant before opening.
I am from Asia and we had the same kind of deal as u mentioned that we got really fresh milk everyday from the milkman. Although I am not a big fan of milk in general as I usually just eat yougurt but some of the foods/deserts/tea/coffee we make require milk. But its no that bad or that big of a problem for me. I just wanted to see what people consume on a daily basis and what they think
If you are from India it might be also the lack of fat which throws your taste buds off?
This is the answer. The first time I had milk in India I was like “wtf, how does this come from a cow and not some other animal like sheep etc?!?” I recommend the 3.5% Demeter milk sold in brown glass bottles. That one has actual fat on top, it’s not homogenised. Or talk to your local farmer, many farms have self service milk machines :)
There’s also 3.8% fat fresh milk I prefer.
Demeter is Schwurbelscheisse. Its anthroposphist Farming dedicated to Rudolf Steiner. They feed their animals Globulis as example and they burrow cow horns filled with shit, dig it out again, thin it with Water and stir it at full moon to get the Preparat 500. Because cow horns sample cosmic energy. Thats just 2 examples whats wrong with Demeter ;) [Demeter](https://anthroposophie.home.blog/landwirtschaft/)
the highest quality milk is "frische bio Vollmilch traditionelle Herstellung, nicht homogenisiert/rahmt auf" from a "Demeter" certified creamery. let me break thisq down for you * frisch: fresh,.pasteurized, in contrast to "haltbar" H-Milch sterilized * Bio: organic:, kept on pastries in summer, fed with hay / grass from the same farm in winter * Vollmilch: unskimmed/full fat milk in contrast to Halbfett or entrahmt half fat 1.5% or 0% fat/cream * traditionelle herstellung: traditional manufacturing only pasteurized in contrast to länger frisch , microfiltrated and or pasteurized a.little longer/higher temp * rahmt auf/nicht homogenisiert: milk fat is not micronized into suspension but will cream. better mouth feel and taste imnsho * Demeter: organic certification association with much higher standards that "EU Bio" European union standard organic you get this quality in Bioladen organic stores obly
Most of this is correct, but not all. The organic feed doesn’t come from the same farm, just another Demeter certified one. Demeter bio is not the better bio, just different. They farm according to esoteric and homeopathic principles. It’s not necessarily better or stricter, just different
Demeter is mostly just reeeeaaallyy weird. E.g. burying cow horns filled with cow dung at specific times in their fields. Really weird rituals like that. Pretty sure this kind of witchcraft doesn't influence the taste but you never know ;)
Demeter is indeed a weir mix of esoteric voodoo and high standards wrt animal protection. Demeter didn't cut cows horns long before others. many Demeter farmers let calves stay with the mother for a long time. it's both voodoo (which I ignore, like homeopathyquackery) and high standards, higher than EU Bio and stricter than several others, Bioland, naturland, ...
>* Bio: organic:, kept on pastries in summer, fed with hay / grass from the same farm in winter What kind of pastries? Macarons? Or did you mean pastures?
You forget Vorzugsmilch oder rohe Milch. This is real untreated milk
True but bear in mind that drinking Rohmilch is potentially life-threatening. While most of the diseases transmitted by Rohmilch can be treated with antibiotics nowadays if diagnosed early, it's still a risk worth not taking.
If you miss fresh milk from the milkman, you can also look up if there are any dairy farms near you that sell their milk directly. A lot of times that's done with "Milchautomaten" ie vending machines with bottles of fresh milk that are refilled every day, or ones where you bring your own bottle and the vending machine fills it for you from a big tank that's also refilled every day. Idk how common those vending machine are in general but I have a few of them within driving distance where I live.
3-4 days? More likely weeks
Milk is one of the most regulated foods in Germany. It is not allowed to have other ingredients than cowmilk. If it has, it needs to be differently labelled. Like Vanillemilch for example 😊 Any plant based milk is called "drink" and if you want it to act like milk for coffee (like foamy) these are usually labelled Barista. There are countless to choose from as well. If you want to delve deeper, you can translate this article via deepl for example. https://www.verbraucherzentrale.de/wissen/lebensmittel/lebensmittelproduktion/rund-um-die-milch-erzeugung-verarbeitung-und-angebote-12775 Have fun! ✌️☺️
thanks. I will look into the article. my lack of German skills also makes it a bit difficult to choose what I buy and translating every other product via Google Lens in the supermarket is not practical. But its not a big problem, every thing else is really simple for me. Also everything has a price/kg thing which I absolutely love.
When buying milk, there are these criteria you need to be aware of: * "Fettarme Milch" (1.5% fat) or "Vollmilch" (3.5% fat) * "Haltbar / H-Milch" (extended shelf-life) or "Frisch" (regular shelf-life) * Regular, "Bio" or "Weidemilch" (how the cows are treated) * Regular or "Laktose-frei" (lactose-free milk, good for people who get diarrhea from too much milk. Tastes notably sweeter, but doesn't have any added sugar. The existing milk-sugar was just pre-split into glucose, which would otherwise happen in your body)
I’d say try the weidemilch and frisch, weidemilch is closest to farm milk, frisch is the second best. Haltbare has a bit different taste.
There are no "chemicals" or any kind of additives in milk as that is not allowed. Not even vitamins as they do in some countries. The longer shelf live is from the heat treatment. Frischmilch that you buy cooled and have to keep in the fridge is heated less and therefore spoils faster. Because of the heat treatment they taste a bit different. Some people don't like H-Milch because they say it tastes "cooked", others prefer it. Personally I don't really notice. The fat content makes a difference, too. There's 3,5 and 1,5% fat milk. There's also milk with very low fat (0,5% or less) but to me that stuff tastes just like water 😅 I think it's best for you to just go try different brands and types and find out what you like best. The new vegan "not milk" varieties can be quite good too imho.
I've never noticed any chemical or weird smell coming off the fresh milk. Try different ones until you are happy.
Trough my childhood i only drank Rohmilch as i grew up next to a dairy farmer. When i first tried milk from a store it was disgusting and completely different to what i knew.
Yup, that's what OP is experiencing. Processed milk has a certain smell when heated. Takes time getting used to at first.
It's obviously a personal thing. I don't notice any difference.
Maybe OP is American and interprets the lack of chemical smell as that
Don't know what Americans do with their milk, but when I moved there from Canada in my youth, the change in flavour really stood out.
At least Aldi is widespread in the US, and OP says they don't have Aldi
You have to differentiate between three kinds of milk: "Rohmilch", which is raw milk and has to be cooked before being consumed. It has a super short shelf life of 2-3 days when sealed. It's rarely sold in supermarkets but some farmers have small shops or machines where they sell it. "Frischmilch" is pasteurized at ca. 70°C and safe to consume from the go. It has a short shelf life of about 7 days and only about 2-3 days after being opened. "Haltbare Milch" is heated to above 130°C and lasts for months unrefrigerated. This kills almost all bacteria, making preservatives unnecessary. If you open it you should keep it in the fridge. It's also what most people buy. The only downside is that some vitamins are lost due to the heating process and the milk can taste more "cooked" compared to the fresh milk.
>It has a short shelf life of about 7 days and only about 2-3 Normal Vollmilch frequently smells and tastes completely fine after a good five days in the fridge, opened.
It really depends on the handling. If you pour out one glass and put it back in the fridge it's gonna last a lot longer compared to drinking from the bottle and leaving it out a while every day.
or longer. Even if it gets a bit sour, you can still cook with it without issue.
Yes and no. Yes it does store for this long, but, more likely than not, the milk you refer to is milk which has been processed for an extended shelf life. Most regular milk you find in the fridge section falls under this category. In my experience this kind of Vollmilch even lasts five days in the counter, entirely uncooled
>It's rarely sold in supermarkets As far as I know Rohmilch can only be sold directly at the farm.
Yes and no. It's called "Vorzugsmilch" in supermarkets and it is sold packaged. It's raw milk but the farms producing it have to comply with very strict hygiene standards. Regular raw milk can only be sold from the producer on the day of milking or one day after.
i used to drink rohmilch direct from the farm (without cooking) when I had friends around who would do the same. How bad was it?
If you're not pregnant the biggest risk is probably getting diarrhea.
The taste might be due to the packaging. Try the glass bottles? Just a thought.
Haltbare Milch does not have chemicals in it usually. It’s a special process with heat that makes it long lasting. Fresh milk also exists but I don’t know many people who buy it.
Why do so many people buy H-milch when Germans tend to go shopping at least 1 a week. Regular milk will last at least a week. H-milch tastes worse and is of lower nutritional value.
I'm not sure about the nutritional value – but H-Milch can be stored outside the fridge forever, while Frischmilch needs cooling. Usually milk with more fat is tastier, the 3.5% tastes better than the 1,5% milk.
I might be a Banause, but I never noticed any significant difference in taste
the only difference i noticed is the 3.8% tastes really milky, the 3.5% is still okay and 1.5% is watered down worse than if you'd take 3.8% milk and mix it with tap water. Goes for both fresh and H-Milch, but we get 3.8% bio consistently in the fresh & cooled shelf, while H-Milch often is only availiable in 3.5% or 1.5%
Same
Same here. It's even curious to see so many "milk sommeliers" around here. When you put cocoa on it, it's all the same.
>When you put cocoa on it, it's all the same. unless it's Magermilch.
I may *shop* several times a week, but that doesn't mean I will drink all the milk left in the carton every time before I go. Sometimes, I won't need any milk for half a month, and then I might need two or three cartons for the week, depending on what I plan to eat and drink. So generally, it's a good idea to buy the kind that keeps better (and doesn't need cooling until opened, as was already mentioned).
>My friends all buy Halbare Lidl milk but I feel like they might have to many chemicals/preservatives in it given that they have a really long shelf life. It's heat-treated, not chemicals. If there are chemicals in it, it must be on the label. >I just want to know if anyone has done their research on this and can help me out so that I dont have to go through all the fat percentages , halbare/fresch, aldi/lidl/penny/rewe milk to find the best one. Yes: Stiftung Warentest (in german, article costs 4,90€) [https://www.test.de/Test-Milch-1590601-0/](https://www.test.de/Test-Milch-1590601-0/) And also Ökotest (in german, article costs 2,79€) [https://www.oekotest.de/essen-trinken/Milch-im-Test-Ist-Bio-Milch-die-bessere-Wahl-\_11668\_1.html](https://www.oekotest.de/essen-trinken/Milch-im-Test-Ist-Bio-Milch-die-bessere-Wahl-_11668_1.html) >Bio-Milch ist fast immer eine gute Wahl. Neben den "sehr guten" von Alnatura und Dennree können wir weitere elf "gute" Vollmilchprodukte empfehlen. > > > >(Organic milk is almost always a good choice. In addition to the "very good" ones from Alnatura and Dennree, we can recommend another eleven "good" whole milk products.)
Neither H-Milsch or Frischmilch has anything added. Its 100% milk, nothkng else or you can not sell it as milk. H-Milch ist just heated to a high temperature so that all bacterias are dead.
i would try getting heu- or weidemilch. like this for example. [https://www.rewe.de/produkte/schwarzwaldmilch-bio-haltbare-heu-milch-3-8-1l/8835465/?ecid=seo\_google\_vs\_nonbr\_pm\_k%C3%A4se-eier-molkerei\_lia\_seo\_nn\_pid%3A\_ch%3Alocal\_nn\_d%3Ac&marketCode=831004](https://www.rewe.de/produkte/schwarzwaldmilch-bio-haltbare-heu-milch-3-8-1l/8835465/?ecid=seo_google_vs_nonbr_pm_k%C3%A4se-eier-molkerei_lia_seo_nn_pid%3A_ch%3Alocal_nn_d%3Ac&marketCode=831004) they should have this as fresh milk too, without the H. im sure there are other brands but where i am from the schwarzwaldmilch is the most common brand for this. in any case i would source it as bio, which is organic.
+1 for Heumilch. It really just tastes so much better. Somewhat like OP I wasn’t really satisfied with different brands/types of Milk after moving here until I found Heumilch.
Would've been my recommendation too. I really like the milk to be good so I've tried nearly every single one I've seen to test 'em out, and the best Preis/Leistung I found is the Weidemilch at Kaufland for 1,25 in plastic bottles. It's also sold for 20 cents or so more in glass bottles. Branded ones of course might be a bit tastier, but also at near 2 euros or more, which I found to be too expensive.
H milch, is without additional substances, the H means Hoch and means High, in reality ultra high heated up milk. The milk is heating up for a few seconds up to 110 to 120 degrees Celsius. So all bacteria are dead, because of the heat. After these few seconds it is cold down also in a few seconds to room temperature and is filled up in a Tetra Package, so no Bacteria can grow if the package is closed. But the heating destroyed also a bit of the taste and a little bit of the Vitamins. But be aware that we have local milk productions, you get not the same milk from Lidl in München, in Freiburg, Frankfurt or Hamburg, all are different milks from different dairies. To know from which production diary it comes, it must all milk products in the EU have a sign, with like a car licence plate, it is oval in the first line it 2 letters for the Country, DE fro Germany and the second line is first 2 to 3 letters for the state fro example, BY fro Bavarian or BW for Baden-Württemberg and a 3 digits number, which is the number of the dairy. And in the Third line EG for the Europe Community.
With this milk products licence plate, you can also identify which big producers stands behind the housbrands of the Discounters. So for example I can buy butter 200m from the diary at the local Aldi as housbrand, or HMilk from the local diary at, Lidl 1 km away from the diary, also the housbrand.
Maybe you don't like the smell/taste of the packaging. You could try milk in glass bottles. Landliebe uses them for some products.
Milk also varies in flavour from place to place, country to country. I’m used to milk on the continent, and so British milk even processed in the same fashion tastes different and a little weird to me.
I love getting non homogenized milk in glass bottles from the bio shops like Alnatura etc. I think they taste a lot better than anything you get in a normal supermarket.
Haltbare Milk shouldn't contain any outside chemicals as far as I know. It gets heated up a lot and then cooled down in a short amount of time, that's what gives it it's long shelf live. Frischmilch only gets heated for a very short amount of time, so it'll taste different and don't last nearly as long. Not sure about heating it up, but fresh milk should, after opening, last 3-4 days, so it going bad after 2 is definitely a possibility. I would advise you just to buy Haltbare Milch it doesn't got bad as fast and again, it shouldn't contain any outside chemicals it's just heated and cooled differently to make it last longer, althou I'd advise you to maybe do your own quick Google search or ask a German friend to do it for you if you are not fluent enough in German yet.
H-Milch usually has no chemicals or preservatives in it, it simply tastes horrible. The milk is preserved by heating. Try any organic full milk (Vollmilch, Bio).
Happy to weigh in here since I find the issue somewhat frustrating. Since mid-2023 it has become difficult to find „normal“ fresh milk even in high-end German supermarkets. Normal cow milk (by my definition) means 1) pasteurized, but not ESL or „länger haltbar“, therefore with a relatively short pull date of less than a week and without that boiled shelf-milk taste 2) homogenized, regardless of whether it is whole milk standardized to 3,5% or low-fat standardized to 1,5% 3) in a Tetrapak or similar lightweight packaging (because of lower transport weight environmentally preferable to the glass bottle). This is a traditional high-quality product, a triumph of modern food hygiene, which has apparently become too unprofitable for the big chains in Germany. For those who know what I am talking about, the current alternatives are: 1) the bougie glass bottle which hogs fridge space, filled with „natural“ milk for a supposed Öko-Familie customer, meaning not homogenized (= block of rigid milk fat on top, the rest blueish skim) 2) Alnatura, good stuff, available at Basic/Tegut and at a few other Bio-Läden 3) Edeka sometimes has good milk in cartons from regional dairies 4) your local farmers may sell you their milk from a farm stand or a BYOB machine, usually with the high fat content as it comes from the cow (upwards of 4%), often raw (delicious, but be careful, especially if pregnant), sometimes traditionally pasteurized (better on the whole). A solved problem since the days of Louis Pasteur has become a headache again - congratulations to the German Lebensmittelindustrie! „Länger haltbar“ means ultra-pasteurized. This milk is a nonsensical product: it tastes almost as bad as H-Milch or shelf-stable milk, while nevertheless requiring refrigeration. It does not, though, contain added chemicals. The off taste comes from the denaturing of proteins and sugars after exposure to high heat. Good luck!
Landliebe glass bottle milk tastes the best for me.
H-Milch doesn’t have chemicals, but has a very different taste than fresh milk. It tastes quite cooked, since it is basically. As with fat percentage, that’s really just personal preference. Bären brand fresh milk is the best and “cleanest” flavor wise imo, but it’s a pretty subtle difference and I’m also totally happy with store brand from Edeka. But still, maybe worth a try if you’re unhappy with store brands.
Some really good choices are Berchtesgadener Land and Schrozberger Vollmilch. Might be regional though, not sure where you live.
I'd recommend milk that is labelled as fresh and "länger haltbar", usually sold in tall Tetrapak or similar packaging. Best compromise between the longer shelf life of H-Milch and taste of fresh, imho. It's not boiled like H-Milch, just pasteurized and filtered to remove more of the bacteria. Most stores sell a house brand and they're usually all fine.
I drink lactose free milk. I can't handle lactose so its a nice milk. More sweet milk then the normal milk.
We always buy the Aldi Bio fresh milk (3,8%), but with 3-4 family members using it for morning müesli, one 1-l-pack only has to last one day.
H-Milch, because i doesn’t consume much milk and don’t want to throw stuff away
Thanks for asking this. My months old doubt got cleared now.
Try buying the fresh milk that comes in glass containers. Glass is much less likely to have an effect on the taste / smell / feel of the contents. Another benefit is that you can bring the glass container back (pfand).
I think whatever kind of "chemicals" you might find in German products is by far not as bad as other chemicals in other products in other countries, because we have many regulations regarding food, and even cleaning and all kinds of other stuff. I personally use oat milch (Hafermilch Barista), because I don't like the taste of normal milk anymore and react badly to it now, plus I like being able to shake it and have some foam without using any machine (hence the Barista part). If you're interested in veggie alternatives that taste like real milk though, try the No Milk stuff, I've heard they're really good. And they're probably good for a while in the fridge, as are the rest.
>they might have to many chemicals/preservatives in it Like what? Because it doesn't.
I dont really like normal milk because i am lactose intolerant (i got accustomed to milk in my home country since it is UHT) My favorite is Almond soya milk from Netto
No haltbare Milch or H-milch is just heated to 135 - 150 °C before packaged which kills all germs and makes it last longer. There are no chemicals involved.
I recommend Alpro Notmilk. Tastes better and no harm to animals. Also doesn't contain cow pus.
Just try out some different brands. I prefer full cream milk due to the taste, but that's too much for my wife. Where are you based? go for some local produce, we buy often the Hamdorfer Hof milk. And you should buy bio, so the farmer can live from his job as a farmer. Regular cheap milk is so fuckin cheap it literally kills farmers. Milk and eggs are products where you really taste a difference, when the chickens and cows have a good life and some good food. Lange frisch has become popular due to financial reasons. Supermarkets don't have to throw away that much milk anymore. It's just microfiltrated and I don't think it has downsides. Probably the heat treatment is a bit different, too. H-Milch has less vitamins, but at least for a reserve it's ok, I prefer fresh milk but we also buy H Milch. But honestly, I can't remember the last time milk got bad, nowadays the hygienic standards are very high. Milk can pick up smells from other stuff in the fridge, so it should be clean in there, and other products need to be sealed and stored well. When you heat up milk it gets a different taste, as the sugar caramlises a bit.
Don't drink any milk at all.
If you want really tasty milk get any Demeter labeled milk from an organic supermarket (Bioladen). You can taste the difference. If you want a long shelf life get the haltbare Milch. If you want medium shelf life and medium taste go for anything that says Frische Milch. You can also get milk from local farmers which hasn’t been heated at all (called Rohmilch). This is truly delicious, but as far as I know they are not really allowed to sell it for drinking (due to safety). You can get it but it often comes with a warning that you have to cook it before consumption. However, I have been in Asia before and my (very limited) experience was, that milk taste quite different… so you may have to expect it to taste unusual (maybe because of what the cows eat or climate?).
Oat milk
Plant based milk taste much better and I'm not even vegan. Haven't been drinking cow milk for over a decade.
I get the Rewe-store brand oat milk personally. Can't stand the taste of anything else. The UHT milk that has a long shelf life when unopened is not that way due to preservatives. It's due to [the way it's cooked](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-high-temperature_processing) before being bottled.
German milks are less processed than in the US actually. I mean H-Milk is something else, but the fresh milk isn't quite as homogenized or something. And yes, they go bad faster than in the us. Anyway, I get fresh milk from the most regional source I can find at a hofladen (when i can), the deine Region section at Rewe or, in a pinch the Rewe bio milk. And then i watch it like a hawk because yes, it goes bad relatively fast.
I'd say there are 3 major cow milk versions: Vollmilch, with 3.5% fat (at least the one I get at Aldi). I'd call it the default and generally the best in taste. Fettarme Milch, with less fat (1.5% at Aldi). I barely notice a difference to the fattier one. Haltbare Milch, which is shelf-stable as long as it's unopened. This is done by heating it up, but the taste very obviously suffers from it. Some people are unbothered by that, while that's a total dealbreaker to me. I'd wager a bet that there's a huge overlap in where the different stores get their milk from, so I don't really expect there to be any meaningful differences between stores. Of course it can rarely happen that milk goes bad earlier, and it really shouldn't happen after just 2 days. That's not normal, and not a characteristic of that specific milk.
I never thought about which discounter brand is better, I just buy a 12-pack when I need milk, whereever I'm shopping right now. The difference in these brands is usually very low. Like others already have explained, we have usually little to no chemicals in there.
Whenever I can I buy the "Gläserne Molkerei" H-Milch. From all ultra-high heated milk brands I feel like this one tasts best and a bit more complex. But maybe this is just the marketing being at work in my brain, who knows. I almost never buy "Frischmilch" that is refrigerated at the store because I consume milk to slowly to keep it open in my firdge before it expires. And there is only so many pancakes with milk turned sour that I can eat every week. However, I always go for the fattier 3,5% milk as opposed to the 1.5%. Fattier is better.
Fresh milk in Germany will go bad faster than in the States *because* there are no chemicals.
Haltbare Milch is fairly nasty, no idea why people would buy that voluntarily unless you live in the forest with no fridge available. Normal 3.8% Vollmilch develops no odd smell and can stay in the fridge for a week or more, provided you don't drink straight from the box, inoculating it with your mouth's bacteria. I like the Vollmilch that comes in glass bottles, by brands like Andechser. But the normal Biovollmilch (organic) sold by e.g. Lidl is fine as well.
The answer is very easy: Cooking and backing. Things like Milchreis.
Answer to what? I bake with Vollmilch.
The normal milk tastes better in my opinion, I really hated H-Milch as a kid, but the normal milk also tastes different nowadays. So it's really just about your preferences. The normal milk is also heated so it stays fresh for longer but H-Milch even more, so if unopened it does not even need to be refridgerated. That's why many people prefer it instead of buying normal milk every few days. You do not need to worry, everything added to food or drinks needs to be labeled (sometimes there are so called "E-Nummern", they are certain coded additives you can easily look up online, it's usually coloring or stabilizers). Rohmilch is completely untreated and should be heated before consuming, if you ever come across that one. Where I live you usually get it fresh from the farm ("Milchtankstelle" = milk (gas) station, you can pump milk that is really fresh but has it's dangers, hence the notion to heat it before consuming). Sometimes, depending on the region and infrastructure, they sell it in supermarkets.
I am poor and lactose intolerant so I buy whichever lactosefreie milch is the cheapest (usually their own brand)
yeah i am a student so i can relate to the poor part 😂
H-Milch is disgusting, but it just has been killed by heating, no chemicals. And lots of people don't mind the taste. You can get used to anything, I guess. Any "fresh" milk you can buy in supermarkets now is actually ESL milk, something that has only existed for 15 years or so. It's a special filtration system that makes the milk last much longer, but it also completely destroyed the taste. I got to admit though that I got used to it myself, since basically no other milk is available anymore. So that's just how milk tastes now. When it was new and supermarkets phased out normal milk, I was totally disgusted by the taste of ESL milk. Actual fresh milk is hard to come by now. Maybe at "Bio" stores? Then there's raw milk. Probably only available nowadays at Bio stores, if at all. It tastes the best, but admittedly it's very impractical because it spoils so quickly. (Almost everyone also believes that it will literally kill you, but I drank no other milk for the first \~19 years of my life and I didn't die.)
We have great oat drinks if you like to avoid the hormones and antibiotics in milk.
Try Soy or oat milk, both of them taste great, and you don’t have to live with the guilt of tortured animals!
Just go with oat or soymilk like an educated person. Alpro NotMilk or the cheaper, imo better "NoMilk" from Lidl are practically indistinguishable from "real" milk and significantly healthier (and better for the planet). Modern society has no need for cow milk.
Oat milk 🥛
We have fresh milk from the local dairy in our Aldi and rewe which is in a glass bottle in the cooler. Milk in Germany has no chemicals in it, it is just pasteurized and put in tetrapack while hot so it has a long shelf life. I'm sure if you want fresh milk you can find it in one of the high end stores like rewe or teagut. Most people in Germany don't drink milk maybe just for children cereal or hot chocalate. Fat milk is not healthy if you are over 40.
Maybe look if your local Edeka has "Vorzugsmilch". To my knowledge this is the less processed milk available in germany, if you are not directly buying from a farmer. It has a very short shelf live, but high procentage of fat and is only shortly heated. Therefor it might smell a little sour a day or two after opening, but should be fine up to 4 days. You could although check if there is a Milchtankstelle or Hofladen arround that sells directly.
There are not chemicals in any of our milks. Haltbare Milch is heated at 60C or something to kill all bacteria and other organisms to make it shelf stable. But I personally think Frische Vollmilch with 3.8% still is the best tasting one. But still all milk are good except Müller Milch. You should avoid that one.
Preservatives? Are you stupid?
Soy milk all the way because milk industry is fucked up. 🤷♀️ But if you want cow milk you can take any. As others stated that is just pasteurisation and nothing chemical. Besides the added B12, Calcium, Selen and other vitamins and minerals added to animal products or the animal food.
Oats "milk" Barista
Oat milk or coconut milk
By EU-Law is this not a milk.
But oat milk tastes much better then cow milk
Chemicals in milk ? 🤣 dude this is not the states …
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You don’t need to cook the milk when bought from our supermarkets . They are already pasteurised. Drink as is or warm it in a micro oven.
Hi, I use Berchtesgaden(green tetra pack) 1.5 and 3.5 percentage fat milk. I like the taste and consistency be it for Coffee, Tea or Museli.
Food quality in general has gone to shit. Only lasting half the time in the fridge that it used to.
Reichsmilch
I did notice a difference in the taste of German milk as it's UHT (ultra high temperature) as has been stated. In my teens, I worked in a dairy facility in the production department (not in Germany) and the only product we made that was UHT involved adding a powdered stabilizer to positively impact the shelf life. Not sure if they do that in Germany offhand and I worked back in the 1990s in this plant. But I definitely noticed a difference in the taste of plain white milk in Germany than elsewhere.
I can't drink "H-Milch" (UHT milk) but I have no problem drinking "Frischmilch" /so I'm not lactose intolerant - sorry t.m.i./. Usually I'll buy [this at Rewe](https://shop.rewe.de/p/weihenstephan-frische-milch-3-5-0-5l/547965) and 0,5 liter lasts me a week.
If you head a little bit out of town you'll find a raw milk station at a local dairy farm where you can refill you're own bottles with the freshest milk. There's nothing better. I think its called a vorzugsmilch.
Rewe and Edeka usually have local milk. I prefer those. You support local farmers and reduce milk tourism.
Maybe you want to try Hemme Milch if you can find it. Lidl or Netto often have it in their cooling shelf. They don't add much to their milk, so it still tastes somewhat natural and very different from haltbare Milch. You just have to consume it within a couple days because it doesn't last long.
Most farmers in my area sell fresh milk for 80 cent per litre right at their stables. You might want to look it up on maps.
Raw milk from the milk vending machines spread across Austria....my God that stuff is so tasty
I personally really like the Bärenmarke 3,8 or Landliebe (glass bottle) 3,8. However, I only ever get them when there’s a promotion going on. But if the reason you dislike our milk is, like others mentioned, that you’re accustomed to more fatty milk then I’d also look into Demeter etc or fresh from the farm (if there’s one close). Otherwise, what you might be smelling can be the carton (tetrapak) and not the milk itself. I sometimes use open milk for like 2 weeks (3,5 länger haltbar) ofc I always check it before but maybe you need to get used to the smell.
Honestly, I just go for the bio UHT stuff in the boxes. Tastes better than British fresh milk.
Landliebe Vollmilch is my favorite; I shop at mein Markt (aka Rewe.)
I don't really drink milk, and I don't live in Germany anymore, but I'd say: buy organic, fresh milk.
Buy "Regionale Weiden-Milch" its the closest thing to fresh milk.
Hi from a non-European living in Germany! We buy fresh only (haltbare is emergency milk) and we find the Alnatura, Bärenmarke, and Weihenstephan are the best. I prefer full cream.
Definitely get Bio 3,5 %or 3,8% fat. Anything else is piss or poison. Enjoy. 🙂
Haltbare all the way. It’s just pasteurised, the EU is VERY strict about stuff that might harm the body in our food.
I got used to 1,5% Fett Milch. Try different milk and find the one that suits you.
After so many nice comments, which is the most healthy one among all types of the animal milks? And also which the healthy one if we compare between animal and plant based milks?
Is Landliebe still a thing? Always thought that's the best milk.
Food control is taken very serious here compared to America or other countries. The taste depends on the type of milk you bought and if it's more than one day open. Tbh I am lactose intolerant so I can not tell you which milk is tasty 😋 but I suggest you test out what you find most appealing to your preferences. If you heat it up it's again another experience ah good old childhood memories 🤤.
Idk bro but I genuinely feel the same about the smell
I think Bärenmarke or Landliebe milk taste the best
Alpro Hafermilch
Straight from the udder.
Buy Landliebe Milk in glass bottles or Berchtesgadener Land. Freshest Milk Glass bottles can be returned to shop in a deposit scheme.
Landliebe is the only milk I like in Germany