Wednesday, December 05, 2007

powdered milk

Even if you don't drink powdered milk, winter's a good time to put a box in the pantry for emergency use.

(You did know that you can't taste powdered milk in baked goods, right?)

18 comments:

DonnaB said...

I use it all the time in cooking!

Linda said...

oh gosh.. powdered milk.. absolute HATE it.. *lol*

In the Dutch caribean (where my husband is from, so we went there a couple of times) it's too expensive to import REAL (fresh) milk, so they drink this all the time.. and it surely tastes horrible..

they also make a simple kind of candy of of this.. they shape it nicely and then give it away as favours for weddings....

if you want the recipe, it's just..

A whole lot of powdered milk
about 1/3 that amount of sugar
and then just enough water (a little!) to make a clay out of that. (and maybe some food colouring, for fun)

Then they roll it out like dough, cut shapes with cookie cutters, sprinkle course sugar on top and stick a toothpick in them and let them get hard (drying.. takes about 10 mins.)

:) greetings from the netherlands!

Cathy said...

It tastes a lot better than that awful UHT long life stuff lol

Cathy

Anonymous said...

We use powdered milk all the time for baking, pudding, and hot chocolate. It beats running out to the store for fresh milk, which our family of two drinks fairly often (2-3 gallons a week)

Anonymous said...

I have gotten lots of dry milk for free from my aunt, she used to get some kind of food box from the church that always had dry milk in it, she won't use it and instead of throwing it out she gives it to me and I use it in my baking, I have even used it to make my baked macaroni and cheese, and no one could tell the difference. Being on a budget with 2 small kids, free dry milk to use in baking and cooking rocks!!!

Anonymous said...

We use powdered milk for *gasp* drinking as well as baking. If you make it with hot water, and then shake it up really good, it tastes fine. For our family, 'real' milk is a treat-only bought on a really good sale or those 'buy milk now because it expires in 3 days' sales.
Works fine for us- and I have a 4 year old, 9 year old and a husband!

Anonymous said...

My hubby and I don't drink milk...so all I ever have is powdered on hand. It's a great staple!

LynnMarie said...

I too cook with powdered milk and like you say, no one can tell. I alos make my own coffee mixes and tea mixes and they too have powdered milk in them. I love the stuff.

Anonymous said...

I mix my powdered milk in a quart jar and keep it in the fridge for cooking/baking. So handy, especially when milk is over $3.50 a gallon ... and we New Yorkers thought gasoline was expensive!

Anonymous said...

I didn't follow directions [blush].

www.higheredhands.blogspot.com

mama k said...

I don't find dry milk to be much cheaper than regular near me. Besides, organic milk is a priorty for us.
But I do like to keep a box on hand for baking though. It's especially good in case I run out of the other kind and I'm in the middle of cooking something. LOL

Adie said...

I also always keep a box of powdered in the pantry. But I grew up drinking only powdered. Dad bought 25 lb bags at the creamery (manufacturing plant), four bags at a time, I believe. Each bag was the size of a large bag of fertilizer! Mom mixed it in a one gallon Tupperware container, probably at least two gallons a day for five kids. Oftentimes, there were unmixed lumps in there. She convinced us that "milk lumps" were a special treat! Can't believe she did that. I never liked our milk, and buying fresh milk was the first thing I did when I moved into an apartment after college graduation.

TJ said...

I have found that powdered milk is a great coffee creamer! I also use in baked goods. We don't like it in sauces or chocolate hot (as it's called in our house). It is a little grainy. I've been lucky to find a huge box on clearance for about $3. That was great. It is so hard to find on clearance or on sale though.

TJ said...

Almost forgot a little milk tip. If you have fresh milk that you buy on or near expiration, add a pinch of salt and it will stay fresh longer. If you have milk that is still good, but getting low, try mixing it with reconstituted powdered. You can stretch it a bit farther, and find a ratio of the mixture where the taste is still pleasing.

Anonymous said...

In this house 'fresh whole milk' does not last a long time. There are 10 kids drinking the milk. (I run a day care from my home) I buy 5 gallons of milk a week. That is for drinking. I make up about 1 to 1 1/2 gallons of dry milk for cooking. I use the dry milk 100% of the time for cooking.
I also have used it in my coffee...It has less fat than the 'creamer' powders...I am used to it now.

Amy said...

Thanks for the link, Meredith! I love using powdered milk and wish that the prices were lower on it. Fresh milk is almost $4 a gallon now so I still think it is a more wallet-friendly option...

Jane said...

As usual you open my eyes to new things. I have only had dried milk once and hated it, but for cooking, I should try that.

Gas and milk are about the same price per gallon here in CA. I never thought of it that way!

Katie Gregg said...

Has anyone ever tried to make creamy soup with powdered milk? My husband loves cream of potato soup, but the recipe I use calls for seven cups of milk. Granted, we get six to eight bowls of soup, so it's not ridiculously expensive, but I still wouldn't mind saving some money and using the powdered stuff--IF it tastes the same, that is. I wouldn't want to ruin his favorite soup!