After Much Research, I Have Finally Found A Way To Get Very Low PUFA Goat Milk

Waremu

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This post is probably more important for those of us who follow Peat's work in a more strict sense, of PUFA avoidance, etc. As many know, I have been low PUFA/peat since 2012, but very low PUFA (under 1 gram per day) for a few years now. And this past year, I have been shooting for around 0.5/0.6 grams of PUFA per day as I experiment with a 'PUFA depletion' type of diet. So for those like me, foods such as skim milk have been a very big staple as skim milk, being only around 0.1-0.2% fat content, is almost void of PUFA. I have been using hydrogenated coconut oil as my main fat source to replace milk fat and keep PUFA low.

Anyway, until fairly recently I have decided to look into giving goat milk a try, providing I can find a low PUFA source of it (skimmed goat milk). Normal goat milk averages about the same fat content as cows milk does, give or take a few grams or less of fat depending on the breed of goat and, more importantly, the diet. But providing the goat isn't poisoned with high PUFA supplements from the farmer, and it sticks to mostly greens/herbs, and some non-soy grains and added vitamins and minerals, then it should be similar to cows milk in PUFA content, and possibly have a little less, according to the research I have done.

My reasoning for giving goat milk a try is that, I must admit, I am a little worried about the long-term effects of folate auto-antibodies from drinking cows milk, as the late forum member @Travis pointed out many months ago on this forum. I have been doing more research on this subject, and while I do think much of the science isn't as clear-cut on this problem in humans as I would like it to be, and therefore it will take more time for the science to make clear of this problem and whether we fully understand the implications, I think it is better safe than sorry in switching to Goat milk. Now, to be clear, I am not anti-dairy and I am at best skeptical of the many criticisms anti-dairy groups have thrown at milk, since many of them could be worked around (for example, switching to A-2 milk to get around the BCM-7 casien issue). And I have done my best to do that, but sadly, there is no practical way to get around the possible auto-antibody issue with cows milk long-term if our understanding on this is correct, short of perhaps expensive folate supplementation in larger doses which may or may not have it's own effects over the long run.

For this reason, I have decided to play it safe and switch to Goat milk, since goat milk does not have the casien or auto-antibody problems cows milk does or may poses. I do not expect any food to be perfect because truth is, no food is perfect. ALL foods give and take, and it is my motto to choose the foods that give the most and take the least, and I think milk is one of those foods, if one can handle it correctly (and that depends on health and metabolic state in my view). That said, I think goat milk is probably closest to healthiest of all the animal foods, or at least is up there, with having the most give and least take. And while I handle cows milk just fine, I do find that I handle goats milk even better, after trying some low fat goat milk for a few weeks.

So that was a brief summary of why I am looking to switch to goat milk from cows milk. Now for the fun part.

Using www.RealMilk.com, I was able to find a good local farmer in my area to source me with high quality raw goat milk. Farmer doesn't feed them PUFA supplements like fish or flaxseed oil --- just corn, barely, greens/herbs/pasture, and vitamins and minerals added to grains, for the most part. So already, it is likely to be closer to cows milk in PUFA content. So now, I must ask myself: is there any way possible to get skimmed goat milk or skim it in a way where it is as close to store-bought skimmed milk as possible?

Well, yes. Meet the cream separator:

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These brands of cream separators are popular in Europe, especially eastern/central Europe. They are mostly used by medium to small scale dairy farmers. The company that sells these produce lower tier machines which are built very well and last long, and are made to skim cows, goat, and sheep milk.

I spoke to the company/manufacturer and they verified this information to me, and also verified what they claim, which is, that the machine was built to skim cows/goat/sheep milk in such a way that very little fat is left. How much fat? 0.02%. That is correct. That is very close to the store bought skim milk which is on average 0.01% fat content in the US.

But I wanted to make sure that this was the case from people who have used it. I looked at some reviews from an inferior cream separator, which boasts it can produce milk with 0.05% fat content, which is more, and I saw one person who bought it give it a review and they even went to the lengths of getting their goat milk tested at a laboratory using Fourier-Transform Infrared Spectroscopy, and they said it gave a result of 0.22% (less than one-quarter of one percent) fat! That is not far from the 0.1% fat content of skim milk in the US! The persons Amazon review:

upload_2019-3-12_23-18-27.png


Oh, and by the way, I researched this person and they are a real person and it is most likely not a fake/paid reviewer. (I was able to find personal info about them to confirm)

So we have the manufacturer which built the machinery verify that it was made to yield skim milk with a maximum milk fat content of 0.02% (as it also claims on it's website), and we have someone who bought an inferior/cheaper cream separator which leaves a higher max milk fat content of 0.05% (though it is still a decent brand in of itself too), and even with that brand, the milk sample tested for even less milk fat than the max content of it's machine (0.05%), yielding around 0.22%, which is what this better brand is supposed to yield. So even their machine yielded skim milk with a very low milk fat content.

So what I am left with is goat milk of a max milk fat content of 0.02%! So it is very close to skim milk in PUFA content it appears. Again, Wikipedia has goat milk and cows milk very close in nutrition/PUFA content:
upload_2019-3-12_23-27-53.png



I did do some research on PUFA content of goat milk, some of which showed lower and higher PUFA content, but it was on average a very small difference of a little bit more or less PUFA, and in many of those cases where the goat milk had higher PUFA, it was from them being given very large doses of supplemental PUFA so that it bypassed their digestion. So again, if this is the average of higher fat goat dairy, which is not given a lot of PUFA, like my source, I am thinking it is very close to cows milk in PUFA content.


The only downside is that goat milk costs more, and the machine is kind of expensive, but it is worth it to me as someone who relies on low PUFA skimmed milk and money isn't an issue for me anyway, but it may be different for others as everyones situation is different.

The company that sells these machines including the machine itself can be found here:

Electric cream separator Milky FJ 90 PP

I am ordering in the next few days and will update everyone on how well the goat milk comes out when I use it, and I will compare it to skim cows milk in the net-fat/cream content.

But all in all, it seems that my goat milk will have just a little bit more PUFA than skim milk, since it won't be like the 0.1% cows skim milk, but have a max fat content of 0.2%. So that is still very low PUFA. I am thinking I could still drink half a gallon of skimmed goat milk and still stay well below 1 gram or even 0.5 grams of PUFA from the milk alone with this machine. It seems it will take two servings of skim milk to equal one serving of the skimmed goat milk PUFA content.

So now I have a way to get very low fat/almost fat-free, very low PUFA goat milk that digests well and I do not have to worry about the auto-antibody or Folate Binding Protein issues of cows milk, and no issues with BCM-7.

Thought I would share this with anyone else who is looking for a way to consume probably the lowest fat skim goat milk available, since it seems almost impossible to find skim goat milk in most places. Also, if you cannot source raw goat milk, this machine will also work on store-bought pasteurized goat milk just as well!

The machine I linked to and will buy is around $500 after shipping. If one is looking to get a similar machine and doesn't want to spend that much, there are models that are still good but yield milk with a 0.05% fat content, which is a little more fat and PUFA, but they can get those for around 100$ or a bit more. They have ones that are $3000 and $6000 and up, but those are for larger scale dairy farms that deal in larger volume of milk.


All this thinking about goats lately has gotten me into looking at videos and pics of them and longing for a possible day of owning my own pet goats. These cute guys are growing on me.

54434617_328815677755501_7500687927471505408_n.png
 
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opson123

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Sounds like a lot of work. Hasn't Ray been drinking a gallon of normal pasteurized and homogenized cow's milk for decades? I haven't seen him mention that antibodies or folate binding proteins are an issue. I've read Travis' posts about them and I guess those cornerns could be valid, but at least Ray himself seems to be fine even after decades of milk consumption.

I have severe OCD and perfectionism is a part of it, so this 'just in case' behavior hits home with me. Even though a probability of something is small, or the potential harm isn't significant, the probability is there, so the only way to have a peace of mind is to do something 'just in case', even if it takes a lot of effort.
 
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Waremu

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Sounds like a lot of work.

Perhaps. It may look like a lot of work, but not to me.... it isn't much work. I mean, I would be running all of my goat milk for the week through the machine, once each week. It's not hard to wash out and assemble either. It's very similar to using a juicer, actually. But it definitely depends on the individual, whether they find it worth doing or not, with regards to time and the work involved.

Hasn't Ray been drinking a gallon of normal pasteurized and homogenized cow's milk for decades? I haven't seen him mention that antibodies or folate binding proteins are an issue. I've read Travis' posts about them and I guess those cornerns could be valid, but at least Ray himself seems to be fine even after decades of milk consumption.

Oh yes, absolutely, Ray has been a heavy milk drinker for decades. And I have known of many healthy milk drinkers who lived into their 90's and 100's drinking massive amounts of milk, so it can definitely be done. And, admittedly, that is one of the things that makes me skeptical of the whole milk/folate auto-antibody issue. If it is more case specific, it seems to lead me to believe it may be more related to gut health/how one breaks down the milk, and whether it is homogenized or not. Even Travis, if I recall correctly, partly agreed with this. So that is why I say it isn't a black or white issue as I do not think our understanding on the science of it is 100% yet and is likely to take more time and research and human trials on milk drinkers over the long term. I think someone asked him but Ray just answered "no" (that he wasn't worried about it). But that is all I have heard from Peat on the issue.

That said, Travis did present a rather convincing argument and I think at that point, it's an indivual thing whether someone wants to play it safe than sorry and drink goat milk instead or not. Ray Peat does seem to be in very good health for his age and not only that, but he is very sharp and witty for his age too, even mentally, which would seem to go against the milk folate theory, especially with regards to it's possible effect on the brain/cognitive health that Travis presented. But it seems Ray has none of those issues when you talk with him and listen to him talk with people. If someone is on a cognitive decline, especially the older they get, it is almost always very noticeable as they age.

I have severe OCD and perfectionism is a part of it, so this 'just in case' behavior hits home with me. Even though a probability of something is small, or the potential harm isn't significant, the probability is there, so the only way to have a peace of mind is to do something 'just in case', even if it takes a lot of effort.

Oh nice! Welcome to the club. I am the same way as well, lol. And I hate it at times too. Thats exactly how I feel about the issue at present though. I mean, for me, I am not going that much out of the way by switching to goat milk other than the one time cost of buying the equipment, so maybe that is why I think it is worth doing.
 
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olive

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Really interesting stuff, thanks for putting this together. Interested to see what you think of the taste once you get a chance. I find the flavour of goat milk a little overwhelming but perhaps skimmed will be more palatable, akin to cows milk.

Curious to hear what the rest of your diet looks like.
 

Fractality

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Cool, thanks for sharing, definitely something worth considering for us heavy milk consumers. I've been drinking two quarts of pasteurized goat milk on a near daily basis for quite some time now. Aren't the valuable fat soluble vitamins in the fat though?
 

Waynish

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Has anyone explained what an "auto-antibody" means in the Peat sense? Auto-antibodies in raw grass-fed milk?! Well, I agree in the experiential sense; lots of people have increased autoimmune-related symptoms by drinking it (or decreased them by abstaining it).
 

Andman

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Haha amazing i was looking at basically the exact same idea lately, because low fat or skim goat/sheep/a2 cow milk is impossible to find in my area.

if youre in europe, ive seen similar milk seperators from ukraine at around 200€ on amazon. the reviews are actually quite good

thank you for taking the time to make this thread, please keep us updated!
 

Cirion

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Dude, this post is gold. If you could give + reps to people on these forums, I would give you like +1000. Especially since it comes on the heels of a stark realization on my part. Literally, this post is almost like an answer to prayer haha because this morning I woke up needing to change my diet and almost the first post I saw this morning was this...

- Increasing fats a lot has become a failed experiment to me, much like going low PUFA has been a failed experiment (My temps have dropped below 98F in the mornings... sigh)
- Have been depressed thinking what to try next
- Saw your post, motivated to try low PUFA again, this time with higher quality milk

The other advantage of this machine... you could take cheap whole cow's milk from the supermarket, and skim it yourself, this way you would have skim cow's milk that doesn't have added vitamin A or D to it. This is really important especially if you think you might be vitamin A toxic. Plus, I am not a fan of added vitamins as a general rule anyway. But yes, the skimmed goat's milk seems particularly interesting... as that's even safer...
 

Cirion

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A quick question though you say this:

The machine I linked to and will buy is around $500 after shipping. If one is looking to get a similar machine and doesn't want to spend that much, there are models that are still good but yield milk with a 0.05% fat content, which is a little more fat and PUFA, but they can get those for around 100$ or a bit more. They have ones that are $3000 and $6000 and up, but those are for larger scale dairy farms that deal in larger volume of milk.

Wouldn't the 0.05% be better than the 0.2% you quote? Or am I missing something? So the $100 one results in only 0.05% fat?
 
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Waremu

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Really interesting stuff, thanks for putting this together. Interested to see what you think of the taste once you get a chance. I find the flavour of goat milk a little overwhelming but perhaps skimmed will be more palatable, akin to cows milk.

Curious to hear what the rest of your diet looks like.

I have had goat milk before. It varies somewhat depending on where you get it from, but it mostly all has the same type of flavor. It can be an acquired taste for some, and it was weird at first to me, but after having goat cheese I went back to trying it a few times recently and I feel I can handle the taste after a while. So I would say make sure you get it from a decent source and try it long enough to see if you end up changing your palate to it. Thinking of it like goat cheese helps for me. I had goat cheese on pizza years ago and loved it and I think it hasn’t its own unique flavor. But I notice I do feel better and handle it much better than cows milk (though I handled cows milk just fine) and feeling as best as I can feel to me is so worth it. I feel very satiated drinking gost milk as well. But I will definitely let everyone know how it tatses after I buy the machine.
 

Jennifer

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I looked into getting that same cream separator back in 2015ish when I was trying to keep PUFAs as low as possible so I can understand Waremu's desire to do so, as well. I have a lot of biodynamic farms around me that sell raw 100% grass-fed A2 cow's milk (it's even legal to sell it in stores here in NH) and was using a turkey baster to remove most of the cream. Ignoring the possible oxidation issue, I opted for non-fat goat milk powder (Mt. Capra brand) instead, in hopes of overcoming my dairy allergy. I think I purchased it from vitacost.
 
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Waremu

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Cool, thanks for sharing, definitely something worth considering for us heavy milk consumers. I've been drinking two quarts of pasteurized goat milk on a near daily basis for quite some time now. Aren't the valuable fat soluble vitamins in the fat though?

Yes, that is where the fat soluble vitamins are found, but if I am doing very low PUFA I get my vitamin A from liver so now worried about that. And I get vitamin D from sun or supplement. But if one wants low fat goat milk with little cream for a little bit or Vitamin A and D for possibly better calcium absorption then they could leave a little cream in by adding a small amount back.
 
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Waremu

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Dude, this post is gold. If you could give + reps to people on these forums, I would give you like +1000. Especially since it comes on the heels of a stark realization on my part. Literally, this post is almost like an answer to prayer haha because this morning I woke up needing to change my diet and almost the first post I saw this morning was this...

- Increasing fats a lot has become a failed experiment to me, much like going low PUFA has been a failed experiment (My temps have dropped below 98F in the mornings... sigh)
- Have been depressed thinking what to try next
- Saw your post, motivated to try low PUFA again, this time with higher quality milk

The other advantage of this machine... you could take cheap whole cow's milk from the supermarket, and skim it yourself, this way you would have skim cow's milk that doesn't have added vitamin A or D to it. This is really important especially if you think you might be vitamin A toxic. Plus, I am not a fan of added vitamins as a general rule anyway. But yes, the skimmed goat's milk seems particularly interesting... as that's even safer...

Lol. Thanks. Yeah, there are definitely many benefits to having the machine.

Yeah, it can be hard making drastic changes, especially when you haven’t been eating this way for a long time.

If it is of any help, I will share my experience and say that when I was new to Peats work, I didn’t see sustained results eating this way until after like a year, though I did notice improvements in a sleep quite fast. I gained weight into my second year by eating too much fat, and then started cutting the fat and lost weight into my third and fourth year. If I could do it all over again, I would have watched my PUFA and total fat intake more closely, and my calories and not eat much above maintance. I also try to keep up to date on Chris Masterjohns work with regards to methylation. I find I feel better when I try to focus on getting all the nutrients I need to support proper methylation. (Choline, lots of Vitamin B2, B1, folate, B12 and Zinc containing meals throughout the day, enough gelatin and protein, calcium, salt, etc.)

A lot of it is just trial and error in finding what works for you and going by how your feel is very important, though I still think adjustments are also natural.


But for me it took a few years before I started seeing the sustained metabolic improvements of very low PUFA and slowly losing some fat or at least not eating so much that I gained fat and just maintained until I was in better health helped with that as well. At this moment my fat isn’t still fairly low, just not too low. But I’d say, take your time and go into it slowly. Too many changes to quickly can also be tough. And definitely go by what makes you feel better, but also definitely give whatever you so time. I would tell myself that I ate poorly for many years and simply wont undo all that overnight or in a year. That helped give myself perspective, lol.
 
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Waremu

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A quick question though you say this:



Wouldn't the 0.05% be better than the 0.2% you quote? Or am I missing something? So the $100 one results in only 0.05% fat?


The one that is around 100$ yields milk with 0.005% milk fat and the 500$ + machine yields milk with 0.002% milk fat, so the latter would yield lower fat and likely lower PUFA milk.
 
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Waremu

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Haha amazing i was looking at basically the exact same idea lately, because low fat or skim goat/sheep/a2 cow milk is impossible to find in my area.

if youre in europe, ive seen similar milk seperators from ukraine at around 200€ on amazon. the reviews are actually quite good

thank you for taking the time to make this thread, please keep us updated!

No problem. Yeah, I think the cheaper brand I mentioned was from Ukraine too. Maybe it’s the same one. Yeah. It really helped to see people who got their milk fat content tested in a lab because it verifies that it works well and saves me from having to do it. Lol.
 

schultz

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I've wanted a separator for years. If you get the Milky let me know how it handles!

All this thinking about goats lately has gotten me into looking at videos and pics of them and longing for a possible day of owning my own pet goats. These cute guys are growing on me.

Goats are wonderful. I have a lot of good memories with goats. Unfortunately my barn burned down completely about a week and a half ago and my 2 favourite does died, and 2 1 week old kids :cry , as well as a Ewe and her two lambs. Saved the rest of my animals.

I find the flavour of goat milk a little overwhelming but perhaps skimmed will be more palatable, akin to cows milk.

I own goats and the milk tastes just like cows milk IMO. Occasionally one of the goats will give a funny tasting milk, and I have never exactly figured out why (though I have a few theories). I have tried milk from the store and it tastes nothing like fresh goat milk. I have a feeling some of the short chain fats are a bit volatile and maybe cause off flavours after the milk has been on the shelf for a while, especially if it has been pasteurized.
 

Fractality

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The other advantage of this machine... you could take cheap whole cow's milk from the supermarket, and skim it yourself, this way you would have skim cow's milk that doesn't have added vitamin A or D to it. This is really important especially if you think you might be vitamin A toxic. Plus, I am not a fan of added vitamins as a general rule anyway. But yes, the skimmed goat's milk seems particularly interesting... as that's even safer...

Does anyone know if these machines would work on homogenized milk? I think you would have to buy non-homogenized milk in order to separate the fat.
 
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jb116

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Slightly OT: why did you write "as the late forum member Travis pointed out..." ??
 

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