“An almond doesn’t lactate:” FDA to crack down on use of the word “milk” | Hacker News Reader

“An almond doesn’t lactate:” FDA to crack down on use of the word “milk”

arstechnica.com

24 pointsrbanffy22 comments

I double checked the URL to make sure I wasn't walking face-first into Poe's Law. As funny as that quote is, I can't think of anything that is a more pointless use of the FDA's time.

Almond milk isn't even a potentially confusing idea anymore; everyone is aware of what it is (enough that it is a well-accepted term) and no one is going to buy it thinking it comes from a cow. In fact, it not being a dairy product is what drives it's consumption, so it is not in the interest of the manufacturers to try to have almond milk be confusable with normal milk for consumers.

Baby's still die from parents giving soy milk.

Don't ever discount how foolish people can be.

Same would likely happen if fed exclusively on cow's milk. Baby formula is fortified with fats, carbs, vitamins and minerals for a reason.

Also almond milk (and soy milk?) predates the FDA and the USA, so prior usage.

Unfortunately I think you're underestimated how uneducated some of the population is. I think everyone knows it's not dairy, the confusion comes in if it's nurturing like milk. When people say "milk" the first thing that comes to mind (usually) is a mother's milk (any mammal.) So when they see "almond" and "soy" milk they probably think they are equal alternatives which just isn't true.

Right, the almond milk doesn't have the hormones to help a baby cow grow big and strong.

You absolutely should not raise a calf on almond milk.

I don't know if you're being sarcastic, but there have been cases of parents feeding their babies almond or soy milk instead of regular milk. Some people still actively encourage it; without any supplementing of actual milk this is quite dangerous.

The sarcastic point is, cow milk is not a replacement for human milk or infant formula either.

Reminds me of the "melloream"[0] nonsense that happened in New York. Oat milk creamer became significant competition for the dairy industry. Then a law was passed that classified non-dairy milks as "melloream", required that they be regulated exactly like dairy products and also be pasturized. Of course nobody knew what "melloream" was, so it doesn't sell. Just a protectionist law that only helps keep up some businesses' profits.

A similar story is Unilever and the Egg Board's squabbles with Hampton Creek over "Just Mayo" and whether it was actually mayonnaise. [1]

[0] https://books.google.com/books?id=JkrdDAAAQBAJ&pg=PT98&lpg=P...

[1] http://fortune.com/2016/10/10/american-egg-board-hampton-cre...

Personally I think we could push back on the dairy industry and instead force them to label all their milk as 'Cow Milk'.

The dairy industry does not own the word.

Will they regulate milk of magnesia too, or is it cool cause they're a megacorp?

Mega corps... As opposed to all those little boutique outfits making almond milk?

Out of curiosity, I researched it. Blue Diamond Almonds do about 1b in revenue every year. Philipps is owned by Bayer, which does 35b.

Both are large, but I think one has more leverage than the other.

This might be related to the upcoming arrival of 'clean milk'. That is milk 'brewed' with yeast: http://www.perfectdayfoods.com. I personally think this is going to be a game changer. The dairy industry is ripe for disruption and is not sustainable at all.

I doubt that has anything to do with the startup du jour. Are you connected to them somehow?

If you pay attention to shelves, almond and soy milk are gaining in popularity. The dairy industry is attempting to slow the momentum of an extant product class.

I'm not connected to them, but do admire the idea. They just secured a 24M funding and are partnering with some of the bigger players to substitute animal based milk proteins with yeast based proteins: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/sep/13/animal-f... . I think that yeast based proteins should be cheaper compared to animal based proteins and this would be one of the reasons why all the way down in the chain they will be replaced.

Clear case of good regulation vs bad regulation.

Sorry! As much as I try to avoid any comments of a political nature, my capacity for self-restraint wasn’t up to the task this time.

Finally I'll have the FDA on my side when I refer to soy juice as soy juice.

Guess we better outlaw the term "peanut butter" too then..

It's closer to dairy butter than apple butter, at least.

Actually in The Netherlands for this reason peanut butter is actually called peanut cheese (because the word butter is only supposed to be used with products that contain actual butter).

So from one dairy product to another?

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