Goat Milk vs Cow Milk

Goat milk is also easier to digest. My stepfather is lactose intolerant and suffers with all cow milk products (save for a small pat of butter here and there), but can happily eat TONS of goat cheese. :-)

It's not a regular item in my house b/c it is a bit more expensive, but the kids and I like it just fine when we're visiting.

My friend raises goats and sells the milk for next to nothing. She strains it and that is all. She says a lot of people who can't drink cows milk have no problems with goats milk.

My 14 month old drinks goats milk. Cows milk gave her blackish/grey/green yucky poops, so I didnt like that, it didnt seem right. She loves goats milk, and the poops look just like a strictly bf baby. I nurse, am & pm & she has goat milk in between. Personally, I think it has a bit of a funny taste-more a smell, Ive put it in coffee, blah, no thanks. I spoke to a dietician about it, and it has several benefits (cant remember them all... but it sounds better than cow milk.) SHe has gained 2 lbs since turning 1 year, so seems good... :) give it a try.

We use Meyenburg brand goat's milk that you find in the refrigerated section of the grocery store. It tastes really good. Some goat's milk tastes odd and the powdered ones are as bad as the powdered cow's milk. It is better for you and I recommend it for ladies that can't breast feed. It is closest to human milk as far as proteins and enzymes. It causes no mucous like cow's milk so seasonal issues are not issues anymore. It has fewer chemicals (ie preservatives, pesticides, antibiotics) and it's not much more expensive than organic cow's milk.

If you son is willing to try it I would go for it.

My two cents.

M.

We used to own dairy goats. We drank it raw, which is the best way to drink milk as it contains all the nutrients and enzymes needed to digest milk. Pasteurization kills off the nutrients, making the milk most people drink just dead milk. Of course, they then add vitamins back to it to make it seem a bit better, but the raw, natural form is the best. My caveat is that you get your raw milk from a clean dairy that handles their milk in a sanitary fashion. It is the most like human milk, so we digest it better than cow's milk at any rate. We've also made cheese with our milk, which the family enjoyed.
You might want to check out this website for great info about goat's milk and local dairies where you can buy it (and the legality of buying it where you live): http://www.westonaprice.org/ Of course, the government thinks they should interfere on what we eat and drink. Nanny state and all.

My daughter drank it frequently when she was weaned from the breast. I rotated cow, goat, and rice milk to add variety and challenge her palate. She definitely preferred the goat milk for a long while and I liked the extra calories she was getting. Also, goats are often raised in a healthier way...no hormones, less antibiotics, etc.

If you have a local farmer's market, check and see if there is a goat farmer there. The Meyenberg that you can buy in the grocery is fine, but fresh (they do pasteurize unless they specifically sell it as raw) is creamier and has less of the tang I associate with goat milk and its cheeses.

I used to eat goat milk cheese before going dairy-free completely. It's yummy but a little bit more tangier than the regular cow's milk cheese. For some people, it may be an acquired taste. I know that you can also purchase goat milk yogurt that is flavored but I haven't tried it.

When I was talking to my doctor about my dairy allergy, he told me that the molecules in goat milk more closely resemble human milk and are, therefore, easier to digest and less likely to cause an allergic or intollerance response. The molecules in cow's milk are a lot larger and that is why so many people and children have a hard time with it.

Hope this helps.

My oldest son drank it instead of cow's milk as a toddler. He was allergic to dairy (has since outgrown that allergy), but could tolerate goat's milk. He was also allergic to soy so that wasn't an alternative for us and I couldn't get him to drink rice milk. I thought the flavor was pretty close to whole cow's milk--just a little richer and maybe even a nutty flavor. It was expensive though. We bought a pastuerized local brand in the refrigerated dairy section at the grocery store. I would be very careful about taking some of the suggestions here to get it raw. Here in MN we've had a food poisoning outbreak linked to raw milk and that particular farmer has been or may be put out of business. The bacteria is especially dangerous for young children.

A couple of friends raise goats and use the milk for drinking and making cheese. I can't abide the stuff but they love it.

My husband and I are allergic to casein, which means no cow dairy products. However, goat and sheep products don't bother us. We use sheep cheese (Marchengo from Spain), which I grate to look like Parmesan, and goat cheese (raw cheddar, which I shred to look like Mozzerella), and goat butter. I love goat milk, but my husband and daughter don't care for it as much, and I usually can't drink it all before it goes bad. I also would prefer to drink whole, raw goat milk and haven't found a farmer yet to buy it from. We also drink other alternative milk products, like rice, hemp, oat, almond, coconut, and hazelnut milk.

I absolutely love goat milk products and wish they were easier to procure (like goat cream cheese or goat sour cream or goat cream). I love the flavor!

I give my 17 month old daughter goat's milk b/c when I tried giving her cow's milk around 13 months, she would wake up at night crying with really bad gas. She really likes it and asks for it at meals. I haven't tried cow's milk with her again although I might in another couple of months - mostly b/c it is more expensive and it would be one less thing to have to remember to buy. She can eat all other diary - cheese, yogurt and cow's milk when it is cooked like cream of wheat made with milk instead of water.

All our kids did a stint on goat's milk. With our oldest we lived on a small acreage and were able to house a goat and milked it ourselves. With the others we found local farmers who supplied us so we could use it fresh daily. When you are using fresh goats's milk what ever the goat is eating can affect the taste of the milk greatly. So a steady diet of fresh hay/grass/etc is important. Our pediatrician told us it was the closest thing known to human breast milk.

We used Goat's milk for our son! We did not like the powder kind, just go to local health food store and they will have it in refrigerated section. kind of expensive. i have been told it is the second best kind of milke...breast being first. i did hear that it lacks folic acid or vit d...i can't remember which? i think breast milk lacks vit d...so maybe the goat milk also lack vit. d. so you will need to supplement for that. GO FOR IT!

Goat milk is the next best thing to breast milk. Just missing 3 nutrients which can be made up for by food and supplements. What people don't understand is that kids need saturated fat, it's part of what is needed for growth. When I could no longer pump milk at about 10 months old, I switched to raw goat milk. I added agave nectar to sweeten it and my baby took it in the bottle. You can also add xylitol to sweeten it a little as it does have a little bit of a "goaty" test I think.

I'm assuming that your son is past the breastfeeding stage, so if he wants to try it, go for it. If that doesn't agree with him, would it be possible to mix yogurt w/organic milk to water it down a bit. Don't choose yogurt that is fat free...go for high saturated fat content and organic yogurt that is. Goat milk is an acquired taste.

My daughter has had issues with cow's milk since birth. We have heard that some kids outgrow those issues and we have tried to transition off of soy products by introducing some goat products. My daughter loooves goat munster cheese! I think that goat milk has less or no lactose and the protein structure is different so people who can't tolerate cow milk can often can tolerate goat. Good luck!

Goat milk is a staple at our house. It's usually more expensive than cow's milk, but it is absolutely worth the extra pennies. As some posters have said, it's much closer to human milk than cow, so it's much healthier, as well.

If you get it fresh directly from a farmer, it's usually pretty cheap: especially if you can buy a large quantity. Here's a tip my family uses: We just pour it into quart or gallon zipper freezer bags (carefully hold the top of the baggie so it doesn't flop over and spill the milk everywhere!) and then gently squeeze out as much air as possible, seal it, mark it with the date and freeze it. All you have to do to use it is take it out and leave it in the fridge (in a bowl or some container, just in case. Don't want it leaking!). Once it's thawed, use it as fresh.

My kids prefer goat over cow. They've been drinking it since they were tiny, though. They occasionally get cow milk, but more often we'll drink rice, almond, hemp, soy, oat, etc. Goat is their favorite, though!

It tastes a little different but there is nothing wrong with it. Just make absolutely sure it is pasteurized (just like cow's milk). You would not want your son to get Salmonella, , Listeria, Campylobacter or a myriad of other bacterial diseases that raw milk can transmit.