Ignoring pasteurization and refrigeration for the sake of argument, how does milk straight out of the cow and into your mouth taste?
Sorry I know it can be hard to describe a taste.
Purely anecdotal, but the time I tried fresh milk while working at a dairy farm, it tasted pretty much like regular milk that had been watered down. It wasn’t exactly direct-from-the-cow – I didn’t pull a Tom Green and squirt udder juice into my mouth, or anything – but it hadn’t been processed yet, so I guess it was about as fresh as I’ll ever taste.
When I went camping, years ago, with the Scouts, we were supplied with milk and eggs from the farm we were camping on. Tasted pretty much the same to me.
While it was before Tom Green’s time, I did pull a “Tom Green” and squirt udder juice into my mouth. Actually, usually an uncle did it while milking. The milk is IMHO gross because of its warmth, but it tastes about the same.
I’ve never had milk “straight from the cow”, but we do regularly drink raw milk (non-pasteurized, non-homogenized). I think it tastes “richer”, and more “milky”, perhaps because it has all of the natural milk fat still in it. “Normal” milk is processed by removing all of the fat (creating skim milk) and then adding fat back in to create 1%, 2% or 3% (whole) milk.
I used to hate whole milk; it tasted too heavy and too like cream for me to drink. I don’t have that problem at all with raw milk.
I drank plenty of raw milk in my young days. All I can say is that pasteurized milk tastes a little like boiled fresh milk. And fresh milk ? Hard to compare to anything…
Warm?
I’ve had cow’s milk squirted directly into a cup. I was very warm. I’d rather chill it first, as I likes my milk ice cold.
According to this website , the average body temperature of a cow is 101 degrees F (39 C).
That is about what I tasted - rich, albiet warm milk. But it was delicious, as Gymnopithys has already pointed out.
I have never had raw milk, but can relate my in-laws’ experience: They both grew up on farms, drank raw milk all the time growing up. Well, it’s been 40 years since that time. They went to a small dairy farm once on a trip and each had a glass of raw milk—and threw up from the taste.
Whatever it tastes like, I guess we really get used to familiar things, and quickly lose our preference for the unfamiliar.
I had some for the first time about a month ago.
It tasted about the same as regular milk.