Milk Taste Help

[6e]

I posted earlier about pasturizing and we did that. This was the very first time we had milked a goat or tasted goat's milk. YUK! It tasted kind of like dirty milk, I guess. There's really no way to explain it. Is it because we pasturized it? This is how I milk. I bring up the doe and wipe her udders with a hand wipe that has alchol on it. I milk into a stainless steel bucket and then bring inside and pour through a strainer with a coffee filter in it into a stainless steel pan with a frozen pack in it. I let it sit there until I milk the other doe and then put them together. I then strain the milk again and put it in the freezer until I'm ready to do something with it. Did I do something wrong? Or does goat's milk just taste that way? If that's just the way it tastes, I think we'll stick with goat's milk soap and lotion.

[commomsense]

1. I wouldn't put alchol on on the udder.
2. The pasturizing isn't helping the taste and is killing the good bacteira[sp].
3. Are you keeping the milk in a Stainless steel pan till you drink it.
4.Are you freezing the milk then thawing it when you want some.
5.It might be something your goat has eaten.

[lijj]

I don't pasteurize my milk and it tastes very creamy. I actually like it, but no one else in my family will drink it. Something about coming out of a goat, not being pasteurized. *sigh*

[6e]

Yes, it is kept in stainless steel until I pasturize it, then I put it in glass. And I freeze the milk before I pasturize it as I'm not in the mood to pasturize at 5 in the morning.
The milk almost tastes bitter or something. I can't hardly explain it, but I fear not pasturizing because some of the milk goes to an infant and I know there was some fur in it and dirt and whatever else fell off the doe while she was moving around and I worry about germs that could be in the milk if I don't sterilize it.

[okgoatgal2]

first, modify how you wipe. use a clean rag, or papertowel in just plain mildly soapy water. wipe dry. milk into the stainless pail, do not strain thru a coffee filter-get some cheesecloth or some true dairy strainers, or a clean, bleached double rinsed plain white cotton cloth cut to size and used exclusively for this purpose. strain/filter the milk all at once, into glass jars, clean and sterile. also, don't freeze it before you drink it....just put it in the fridge. are your does near a buck? that can give an icky taste to milk. if they are eating certain foods it can give their milk an icky taste. what breed? some breeds have a tendency to "goaty" tasting milk. we always drink ours raw-i do not like it cooked. my youngest was raised on breast milk and raw goat milk-he's 6 now and super healthy. only gets sick once a year, and it's allergy related.

[Milking Mom]

If you get some clippers and shave the goat's underbelly and udder and her thighs and up the back of her legs (this is called a dairy clip) it will help keep the dirt and hair out of your milk bucket. I use the babywipes with alcohol in them and as long as they aren't wet when you are milking and dripping in your bucket it isn't hurting anything. I use a babywipe and lay it flat in the palm of my hand wipe and wash off both teats, flip the babywipe over to the cleanside and wipe them down again. If I have a doe that is dirty because she had been laying in sand or something then I get a bucket or warm soapy water and wash her off to keep from getting dirt in the milk. After I milk I take my milk in the house strain it up and pasteurize it right then. When it reaches 165 degrees I immediately set it over in the sink full of icewater and drop one of those plastic ice things in the bucket to help cool the milk down quickly. It takes about 10 minutes to cool it down to about 110 degrees. If I am in a hurry I pour it into my gallon jug and go set it in the freezer for a couple hours, like while I run to the grocery store, and when I get back I set it over in the fridge. I don't freeze our milk. I've frozen some before and I didn't like the taste of it. Something else that could cause your milk to have an off taste is what was mentioned before, what the doe is eating. If she is eating certain weeds, etc. that can impart a bitter taste, such as bitter weeds, cedar, pine needles. Also, a slight staph infection in the udder can cause an off taste to the milk. You can send in a milk sample to have the milk tested to..... Help me out here, I think it is a place called Langston in Louisiana???? Maybe someone else has the info on that.

[mary,tx]

Our goats milk always tasted wonderful until we moved here, and we have had periods with bitter milk. I've done a little reading and found that some plants, including ragweed, which the goats eat will cause this. You might look around and see what is in the pasture.
mary

[commomsense]

6e, If you strain the milk twice you don't need to pasteurize it. I've been drinking raw cows and goats milk even since I was a infant and i'm ok.

[nduetime]

We milk a nubian and a alpine/nubian cross. I use a 1/2 percent iodine teat dip before I milk and after and make sure the udder is clean too. I strain mine with dairy filters ( I will never even try a coffee filter again) twice because I do not pasturize at all. I then just put it in the frig for whatever we are currently doing with it. That is all we have drank since I started milking and cannot imagine going back to cows milk from the store. I just (as in 5 minutes ago) got done making a dish of butter and will use the buttermilk and goats milk when I make mozzarella in the am. Ours has always been really sweet and good so I am afraid to try anything different as I really like it.

[6e]

My husband was wondering if lilly pads is what's causing the bitter taste? We have a pond in the pasture that's covered with lilly pads and since it's been so dry the water in the pond has gone down nearly 10' and the goats have been out there cleaning up the lilly pads. He said he thought lillys were a member of the onion family?
OK, next question.....if I don't pasturize, is it still safe for infants? I don't pasturize for our sake, but for the baby's. What diseases could be in the milk that could be passed on to people? My husband said that next year we probably need to pull the dairy goats up here and feed them nothing but alfalfa/grass hay and grain so that their milk tastes better. I have to say this year was dissappointing. Do you think the taste makes the milk unsafe? I think that's my biggest concern at this time.

[nduetime]

I guess if I were feeding an infant I would probably have the milk checked out just to ease my own mind. If lily pads are part of the onion family that could explain the bad taste, I do not know that for sure though. My goats browse during the day but they are on a fenced in hill and I can control what grows there. other than that they get alfalfa/grass hay and grain. They also get a mineral supplement free choice.

[topside1]

My family drinks raw milk daily and we have never felt better, more energy/great taste. Have you ever thought about separating the milk from your two does? Taste each does milk separately no mixing to compare tastes. If it's the same taste it's what they’re eating or your methods of storing, cleaning and pasteurizing. If one tastes great and the other is Blaaaa, then its back to the drawing/thinking boards. I have twelve goats, three are dairy and I have found all twelve have different personalities and also twelve different eating habits....my two cents. Tennessee John

[commomsense]

6e,the milk won't hurt the infant if it is unpasturized.

[Sarah J]

I think the two possible issues with the bad taste are a) the goats got into something icky that they loved and makes the milk taste bad, or B) freezing it before pasteurizing it caused it. Getting it frozen and then heating it up and then cooling it down again can have adverse affects on milk flavor.

Getting the milk strained and pasteurized right away is important. THEN you can freeze it. Also, don't leave it in the SS milk pail - put it in a glass jar right away (after cooling the milk down again or you'l end up with a shattered jar and a mess of milk to clean up) and put a lid on it. The pail doesn't have a tight sealing lid and any flavors from the freezer can get into the milk as it's cooling down.

I agree - if you milk clean and the barn is clean and the goats are clean and the strainer is clean, then the raw milk is fine, even for infants. It contains the enzyme that helps humans to digest the milk - which is killed during the pasteurization process. On the other hand, TONS of children have been raised on pasteurized milk and have done just fine, and goat's milk is the better choice IMHO.

So. Check the goat yard for anything "odd" that might cause an off-flavor in the milk. Get the milk strained immediately and Cooled down FAST - go ahead and put the ice in the pail as you milk, and then pour it through the strainer into another pail with another ice bottle in it while you milk the other doe. If you can get it down from 102* to less than 50* in less than half an hour, you're doing fine.

AND - my taste buds are the pickiest in the house. If the milk is more than 18 - 24 hours old I WILL NOT DRINK IT. The caprea enzyme in the milk starts to break down and gives it that "goaty" flavor. Drinking it fresh is the only way to go.

Sarah

[mary,tx]

Originally Posted by nduetime

I use a 1/2 percent iodine teat dip before I milk and after and make sure the udder is clean too.

Teat dip is for use after milking. I would not be milking right after I put iodine on. Before you milk, use a wash, not a dip. I use a weak bleach solution: 1/4 cup bleach to a gallon of water. Put it in a spray bottle and spray it on, dry it off.

Straining once through a good milk filter will remove debris. No amount of straining will remove bacteria/germs.

IMO, it is irresponsible to advise feeding unpasteurized milk to an infant. Why, oh why, would any of y'all take that kind of a chance with your precious little children?

mary

[okgoatgal2]

because i know the milk is safe and unpasturized is the best for my children. would i feed raw milk from an unknown source? NO. but, i know my goats and my mom's goats, and i trust it far more than formula or bulk milk from who knows where with a shelf life of almost a month....they're safer drinking my raw goat milk than eating at school or almost any fast food place or fancy restraunt......even as infants.

[mary,tx]

But do you know anything about 6e's goat? She's milking her first goat, complaining that the milk tastes bad, and people are telling her to feed it raw to her infant.

And, no matter how good of health your goat is in, things like e-coli are natural in the environment. Suppose you get a little fleck of something in the milk; straining won't get out that bacteria. An infant does not have a lot of immunities.

[6e]

I would have to say in that case, you're right. I know my goats, but they are animals and they lay around in the dirt and I don't completely bathe them before milking them and I worry about bacteria in the milk that may make the baby sick. I've heard you can even get TB from raw goat's milk. The baby doesn't seem to mind the off taste, but it worries me what's causing the off taste. Is it bacteria in the milk???? Maybe something horrible that they ate that's coming through???? Hmmmmm.....I would have to say that I'm very discouraged about this first attempt. I bought the goats from a very reputable breeder, the editor of the Dairy Goat Journal and we take the best care of them that we can, but still, they are dirty animals and it gets in the milk, especially when they stomp around. We use to feed our older son goats milk when he was a baby, but we bought it from someone else and I guess I just trusted her to know what she was doing, although I always pasturized the milk when I got it home, but I never tasted it myself. I'm not a big milk fan anyway unless it has chocolate syrup in it, but no amount of chocolate syrup would have helped that goat's milk! LOL My older daughter told me she would stick with cow's milk thank you very much. It had a nasty after taste that kind of stuck with you. If I had the nerve I'd go down and taste a lilly pad and see if they taste like that milk. It was a flat, dirty some what metallic bitter taste. It didn't even resemble cow's milk. I don't know, I may give it up for this year and try again next year. I'm a terrible milker and it took me nearly 45 minutes to milk two goats and I got less than a pint. Yep, I'm that slow. Well, half that time was trying to convince them to let their milk down. Oh well.

[okgoatgal2]

you are of course correct. i shouldn't allow my own extremely postitive experiences to allow me to become complacent.
6e, pull the goat from the lilly pads for a day or two, if possible. you can, if you can find someone to do it (try locating a vet who will know something-good luck) test the milk for mastitis and whatever else. if the taste doesn't improve, keep pasturizing, and when the infant gets older, make your own decision on when to start allowing raw milk.

find if you can, an experienced goat person to help you figure out what is going on. i will ask, what breed goat do you have?

i'm personally of the belief that a healthy person, infant or no, benefits from as much raw as possible, and small amounts of whatever build resistance and make stronger in the future, but i'm weird that way.

btw, langston university is in oklahoma. try this link if you want more info. http://www2.luresext.edu/goats/index.htm i've not searched it, but that's where i'd start...but it's mainly meat goats. this one: http://www.dairygoatsplus.com/forum/ may give you more practical advice, that you can actually apply.

[6e]

My girls are LaMancha/Alpine cross.