The dairy product industry seems to have gotten itself together to put a spin on
use of the nutritional word "fat", making it a pejorative suggesting a
waste product or something else distasteful. What happened to the
fresh wholesome cream that we associate with rosy cheeked milkmaids?
More to the point who has dealt recently with the rip-off of selling
"skim milk" at the same price as cream? Who shares in this bonanza?
Are there incentives that get the retailers as well as cheese makers
to conform in this pricing practice? While we are at it, where does
the use of "whole milk", for milk with a certain fixed cream content,
originate when the cream content of the milk coming from the cow
varies from cow to cow, herd to herd, pasture to pasture?. Can we
"follow the money" on this one and identify the source of supression
of any milk related issues? (I'm just a city boy.) |
Request for Question Clarification by
mvguy-ga
on
14 Nov 2003 10:21 PST
Does your question concern practices in the United States
specifically? Many of these issues relate to laws and various price
supports that may be different in other countries. Thanks.
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Clarification of Question by
finler-ga
on
14 Nov 2003 13:38 PST
I am concerned with the United States and more specifically New York
State, although the situation extends to the entire country (and
possibly Canada as well). However it is not any legal requirements
that, in my perception, influence a retailer to stock fewer items of a
"full" (cream content)product than the same brand's less than full
product. As I suggested in my "follow the money", the most logical
reason I can conceive for the skim milk and its variations to be more
prominently displayed, while one has to really search for the whole
milk, is the profit margin. I cannot conceive of any legislation or
regulation that extends to judgemental displays of merchandise. I can
readily conceive of a pack of lobbyists alert to protect the present
situation from disturbance. As I suggest - start with the money.
Thanks for your interest. In New York's celebrated farmers' market -
restricted to the actual producers of the productI once confronted the
person in charge of a particular dairy display with the question and
he evaded it with some nonsense about cost of equipment. Another time
I posed the question to a store manager who
replied with nutritional information, but could not relate this to the
full cream, light or heavy, that he happily offered on his shelves.
This is not a one man war on my part and I do have other more
rewarding things with which to occupy myself. However the question
simply bothers me because I hate a rip-off with which I am helpless to
deal.
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Request for Question Clarification by
czh-ga
on
14 Nov 2003 14:20 PST
Hello finler-ga,
You've asked a compound question and there is lots of information
available on this subject. I'm wondering what you would accept as a
satisfactory answer. Do you want information about milk pricing
strutures? Do you want information about store display allocation
practices? Do you want a discussion about the marketing of various
milk products? There is tons of information available on all of these
aspects of your question. Please clarify what you're really looking
for. Thanks.
~ czh ~
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Request for Question Clarification by
chromedome-ga
on
15 Nov 2003 10:36 PST
Hi, Finler...
I'm going to offer a few observations aimed at the more general
portions of your question. This may clear the way for one of my
colleagues to answer the balance of your question based on hard data
for your area.
To begin with, the turning of "fat" into a pejorative can hardly be
blamed on the dairy industry. As a society, we in North America have
become obsessed with thinness, even as obesity is on the rise. A
glimpse at other sections of the supermarket will show lower-fat salad
dressings, mayonnaise/mayo substitutes, tuna in water (no flavour) vs
tuna in oil (superb flavour, but with more fat) and other symptoms of
the same desire to avoid unnecessary intake of fats. Your buxom
milkmaid of yore, transferred to the modern day, would be frantically
walking the treadmill and oscillating between the Atkins/Zone/South
Beach fads-du-jour.
In my field, for example (I work in a fine-dining restaurant) we use
fewer cream-based sauces, and fewer sauces based on butter/flour
"roux". The trend is to base modern sauces on "coulis" (purees of
fruit or vegetables) or "reductions" (thin liquids such as soup stock,
wine, or juice, reduced until naturally thicker and more flavourful).
House-made sausages and pates, which once would have run at nearly 50%
fat, are now constructed around a 25-30% fat level.
That is the reason that most retailers give more display space to skim
or 1% milk than to whole or homogenized milk: that's where the demand
is. In my own household, even I generally buy 1% (preferred by my
wife and kids) rather than whole milk (preferred by me). My wife
being of Mennonite stock, I do however get to enjoy copious amounts of
cream and sour cream; to Mennonites cream is a food group.
As for the fixed cream content of whole milk (and, for that matter,
"light" or coffee cream vs "heavy" or whipping cream); that is the
result of a long-standing standardization within the industry. As
you've pointed out, milk varies widely in cream content, even morning
vs evening milk from the same cow (parmegiano-reggiano cheese is
traditionally made with both morning and evening milk). Yet consumers
demand consistent products, from day to day. For that reason, the
dairy industry blends milk from its various suppliers to arrive at the
standard 3.25% for whole milk.
As for the pricing structure of milk within any given geographical
area, I am not competent to comment. Hopefully someone in the US can
tackle the hard-data portion of this question for you.
Most major cities have artisanal dairy producers who are happy to
provide whole milk to those who (like yourself)prefer it. Some also
use an older pasteurization process which yields milk that sours
naturally instead of rotting into a foul-smelling mess (have you heard
old-timers complain about that?).
As I never tire of pointing out to my dieting friends, everyone at
some point takes in more calories (especially fat calories) than they
really need. The trick is to make them count by taking them in the
form of something you REALLY LIKE, rather than an impulsive snack
item.
-Chromedome (<---Always happy to talk about food)
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Clarification of Question by
finler-ga
on
15 Nov 2003 15:33 PST
Let me try to make it simple. I am not interested in matters relating
to nutrition, changes in public tastes, industry structure ete etc. A
quart of whole milk had - let's say - an ounce (or whatever) of cream
(before someone forced the homogenization business on us.) Cream
sells for significantly more than skim milk. Someone took the
expensive cream out and substituted skim milk. (Never mind the
passivity of the consumers who might be led into thinking that
particular someone did them some kind of favor.) Accordingly what
should cost less - whole milk or skim milk? Why is are they always
offered at the same price? If you tell me the retailer pays the
distributor or producer the same price and accordingly has no interest
in suppressing or making it hard to reach for whole milk I would be
inclined to say "a likely story!) Does the extra profit - getting
people to buy skim milk permitting the producer to get a better price
for the cream by-product - only land in the pockets of the producers
or is it spread around a little? To put it another way - is there a
reasonable comparative gross margin relationship among the various
milk based dairy products? I would guess there is enough gravy in this
situation to finance lots of "anti-fat" influence. I think I have a
good question in asking where the justification is for prices that
ignore the extra margin provided by removal, without compensation, of
a valuable milk component. Where and when has this question ever been
raised? As I suggested initially - follow the buck!
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Clarification of Question by
finler-ga
on
21 Nov 2003 09:24 PST
Apparently the question is not as simple as it sounds (to me anyhow) -
and I would like to - (1) Rephrase it and (2) double the original
price listing and offering $30 instead of the original $15. The
rephrased question is:
In the production of milk and cottage cheese (and possibly other dairy
products as well) part of the butter fat or cream is removed from the
milk as it comes from the cow. Milk is sold with an amount of
butterfat or cream remaining as determined by industry standards. Any
further reduction of the butterfat or cream content results in milk
sold marked as skim (0%),or 1% or 2% butterfat. The price of cream,
sold as cream, is significantly higher than the price of whole milk.
Cream, that is not sold in that form to consumers directly, is used
for manufacture of cheese and other products. Since the value of the
cream taked out is somewhat higher than the skim milk with which it is
replaced the price of the milk with REDUCED CREAM CONTENT should not
be the same as the price of whole milk. However the practice appears
to be general that the price of milk to the consumer,0%, 1% or
"whole", remains the same. Generally this is also true for cottage
cheese as well which also comes with varying degrees of cream content.
My question is WHO IS RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS RIPOFF? WHY IS THIS
CONDITION BEING SUPPRESSED? WHO OR WHAT ARE ARE THE AGENCIES OR
LOBBYIST GROUPS THAT KEEP ALL THE VARIUUS MILK REGULATORS FROM DEALING
WITH THIS INEQUITY? HAS THIS QUESTION EVER BEEN DEALT WITH IN PUBLIC?
And I also ask is this too hot to handle?
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