Sometimes you feel like a nut milk; sometimes you don’t.
Consumers and diners have started thinking beyond cow’s milk. Maybe you can’t tolerate the stuff. Maybe it feels too heavy. If you’re skipping it for whatever reason, there’s a veritable world of alternative milks waiting in the wings. You can even make nut milk at home with very little effort. This post shows you how easy it is. The Vitamix is one essential tool for nut milks; Instant Pots are another, ideal for cooking the nuts to just the right consistency before puréeing them.
Here are some of the tastiest alterna-milks, whether you make your own or buy a box of it!
1. Oat
Arguably one of the tastiest milks out there, oat milk swept the market when Oatly (perhaps the most excellent of the bunch) arrived on the scene. With a taste some describe as “like cereal milk after a really good cereal,” it’s creamy, delicious in iced coffee, and widely available. As for their health benefit, oats are simply one of the best foods you can eat!
2. Cashew
Delightful in vegan ice cream, with a subtle buttery note people love, cashew milk is just the thing if you want a low calorie, high in protein milk with plenty of fiber and Vitamin E. Flavorwise, be prepared for an almost-sour note!
3. Macadamia
Harder to find and often thinner in texture, some say macadamia milk is perhaps one to skip when you spy it on the shelf. Others are huge fans, comparing it to oat milk in its flexibility, flavor-wise, and saying that it’s delightful in coffee. It tends to be higher in Vitamin E than other alterna-milks. All we know is we’re grateful not to have to crack those hard-as-heck shells!
4. Almond
All hail one of the original alterna-milks! Iconic almond milk remains enormously popular. It’s widely available even at cafés, it’s slightly sweet and delicious in coffee, and it boasts the same amount of calcium as cow’s milk.
5. Soy
The AAP’s preferred cow’s milk substitute for kids who can’t tolerate it, soy is a close match for cow’s milk in calories, fat and protein. One of the first alterna-milks to market back in the day, it has a distinctly soy-like flavor, but it is very easy to find in grocery stores and, along with almond milk, as a popular alternative to cow’s milk at your local café.
6. Rice
This isn’t the milk you want in your coffee. Rice milk tends to be a little light on flavor. Use it instead in pancakes instead of cow’s milk, or any place where you need liquid volume but not a ton of flavor. Those who opt for rice milk tend to love that it’s low in fat compared to other milks.
7. Coconut
Anyone who cooks with it knows that coconut milk is delicious. It’s also very high in fat and low in carbs. We prefer to use it in our cooking, as in curries and anything that needs a splash of creaminess. Pro tip: Let the can settle in your cabinet, then scoop off the cream to garnish a curry. It’s also dream whipped.
8. Hemp
With its omega-3 health benefits and creamy consistency, hemp is a hit. It also has low to moderate protein content, and less saturated fat than cow’s milk. And no, you won’t get high from drinking it!
9. Hazelnut
Wait for it: The bulk of hazelnut milk’s flavor emerges in its aftertaste. It doesn’t taste remotely like hazelnut coffee creamer, and depending on the brand it can taste strongly or not at all of hazelnut. But when it’s great, it’s almost like melted ice cream. That’s impressive for a milk with no saturated fat that’s low in calories, packed with B vitamins, vitamin E, folic acid, and omega-3 fatty acids!
10. Pea
With a consistency some describe as “skim-esque,” pea milk is fairly neutral tasting, believe it or not. A newbie on the alternative milk circuit, it boasts nutritional qualities similar to soy milk and 2 percent cow’s milk. It disappears pretty well in coffee, so it’s worth giving it a whirl if you’ve tired of the usual! Same goes for the quinoa, flax, peanut and other alterna-milks out there in this wild, wide, milky world.