Take home message No stainless steel Today, everything around milk and milk processing is stainless steel (INOX). The cheese vat in which the milk is processed is stainless steel, the milk pipelines through which the milk is pumped and even …
Growing interest for the gut and its microbiome What is a healthy gut? What microbiome belongs to it? How do you steer health, and especially from what age? This kind of research is much needed, because the list of diseases of affluence is growing rapidly. Think of obesity, hypertension, cardiovascular diseases, but also the range of intestinal problems (irritable bowel, Crohn’s disease), or colon cancer. There is increasing evidence, that there is a causal relationship …
Take home message Kefir from SCOBY versus kefir made of a commercial starter? German colleagues (Nejafati et al., 2022) looked at not only the microbial composition of kefir, but also the metabolic products of the bacteria and yeasts present in …
Take home message Symbiocene thinking Through the Dutch TV-programme ‘Tegenlicht’, it became clear, that a new way of thinking, a philosophy, is needed to leave the Anthropocene era behind us. We are living in the Anthropocene, the human-dominated technological age. Australian environmental philosopher Glenn Albre sought new concepts to express our feelings associated with experiencing nature. Unfortunately, many of these feelings stem from human destruction of nature and the environment, urbanisation and artificial ways of …
Take home message One big family? Fermented dairy products vary from region to region, if only in name. Yoghurt is part of this family of fermented products. Lactic acid is produced by the conversion of milk sugar. Sometimes acetic acid …
Lactose intolerance Lactose is milk sugar, found in a concentration of 4-5% in cow milk. People with lactose intolerance cannot digest lactose in the small intestine, so too much undigested lactose ends up in the large intestine. Here, lactose causes …
Vorzugsmilch has existed in German-speaking countries in Europe since the 1930s. People don’t want to use the word ‘Vorzugsmilch’ (anymore), because ‘bevorzugen’, or preferring the raw milk to pasteurised milk, has not received recognition, despite numerous experimental and epidemiological studies. …
How do you find a needle in a haystack? Currently, effort and money are being invested by the Dutch government to take another step in food safety. Raw milk sale will be released on 1 January 2025, but that comes …
Take home message A mummy about 3,500 years old from the Xiahoe cemetery in China. The red arrows point to the kefir grains lying around the neck like a chain (taken from Liu et al., 2024) Lactose conversion SCOBY we …
Take home message How important are the first 1,000 days of your life, and do you count from conception or from birth? In any case, it is clear, that it is only after birth as a new human that you …
