I Miss Milk

I know there are all kinds of reasons not to consume cow's milk. I've embraced a vegan diet. I drink soy milk, rice milk and almond milk these days. Even though we were drinking fat-free milk in our house prior to this vegan thing, I understand that cow's milk may not be healthful. Not to mention the horrors of the dairy industry.

But nothing beats a tall glass of real milk to go with warm chocolate chip cookies straight out of the oven.

I simply cannot drink a glass of soy milk. I can put it over my cereal and it's an ingredient in many of the meals Jane prepares. But I cannot drink a plain glass of soy milk, or even almond milk. The rice milk is sort of like Horchada (a mexican rice milk concoction that's sweetened and there's a bit of cinnamon too), but unless it's doctored...

I miss cow's milk.

No Whey!

Today's post is dedicated to my ritual breakfast. For years now, I have been having a shake for breakfast. No, not Tommy Lasorda, and the shake for breakfast, a shake for lunch, and a sensible dinner thing. But Jane would argue with you. It is a sensible dinner, and generally a sensible lunch too since I'm a 'brown-bagger' bringing my lunch to work most days.

Anyway, that breakfast I mentioned consisted of a cup of milk, a scoop of whey protein powder, a banana and a tablespoon of almond butter. Yum! However, do you see any problems there? I was very concerned that my favorite breakfast was now going to be off limits or at least, not so palatable with the milk/whey substitutions I was required to make. But thankfully, that was not the case.

I've used soy milk, plain and vanilla, sweetened and unsweetened, almond milk (same variations) and rice milk... All were equally palatable, but I've decided on the unsweetened vanilla almond milk as my liquid of choice. As for protein powder, I'm using the soy powder available at my local Trader Joe's. It's relatively inexpensive, but not as tasty as the whey powder.

Overall, there's almost no difference in taste. No whey!

Lane