Milk is a valuable product. You can drink it in its pure form, as well as prepare hundreds of different dishes - from ordinary cereal or omelet to delicious sauces and pastries. It contains a number of important trace elements that provide a person with excellent health and long life. But when buying milk, some people pay attention to this: on one package it says "sterilized", and on the other - "pasteurized". Which one is better to buy? Let's look at the difference between pasteurized and sterilized milk. Well, for starters, we will describe what each of these processing methods is, and why they are carried out at all.
Why process milk?
Of course, the main goal of milk processing is to increase the shelf life. There is no difference between “pasteurizing” and “sterilizing”. Both methods work. Many microorganisms living in fresh milk obtained from a cow simply die when the temperature rises to a certain limit. Therefore, it does not sour and remains milk for longer, not yogurt.
However, there is another goal - disinfection. It's no secret that this particular valuable product can become a source of bacteria that pose a serious danger to humans. Fortunately, destroying them is quite simple - with the same temperature increase.
Now, in order to understand the difference between pasteurized and sterilized milk, we will study both options in detail.
What is pasteurized milk
The process of pasteurization was named after the prominent French scientist Louis Pasteur. It was he who developed the technology in the nineteenth century that can significantly increase the shelf life of food products. And milk was no exception.
The procedure is carried out with strict observance of the temperature regime. First, the milk is heated to +65 degrees Celsius and poured into sterile containers - paper, polyethylene or metal. And then it just cools to ambient temperature.
Today, the process is perfected. Milk is heated to +75 degrees, after which the temperature remains for 20–40 seconds. Some industries use slightly different parameters - a temperature of +85 degrees and holding the indicator for 10 seconds.
As a result of this treatment, pathogens die, but lactic acid bacteria remain. The maximum shelf life in unopened packaging is 15 days. Such milk can be used for the preparation of cottage cheese, yogurt and yogurt.
Milk sterilization technology
Now we find the differences between pasteurized and sterilized milk, describing the technology for obtaining the latter.
This procedure requires significantly more energy. After all, milk has to be boiled. And for this, it is heated to a temperature of + 120 ... + 150 degrees Celsius. And the heat treatment lasts about 30 minutes! Thanks to such powerful heating for a long time period, all microorganisms - both harmful and sour-milk, die. After such processing, milk can be stored for a very long time: in a clean, hermetically sealed package - up to one year. And part of this time, the packaging can be kept in a warm place - there are no sour-milk bacteria that would begin to multiply, turning milk into yogurt.
However, it is worth considering that not only microorganisms die due to the high temperature. B vitamins, which are rich in milk, are also destroyed. And even calcium, because of which it is recommended to drink this valuable product for adults and children, is partially destroyed. Therefore, the benefits of milk are significantly reduced.
Looking for differences
So to summarize. Now we can clearly say how pasteurized milk differs from sterilized milk.
On the one hand, the technology for preparing sterilized milk is more expensive - the process temperature is higher and it takes longer. On the other hand, the result is more effective, since the shelf life is increased tens of times. Of course, this is a very weighty argument.
However, a pasteurized product is more useful. It retains all the vitamins and minerals that are of great value to adults and children. Also, sour-milk bacteria do not die, not only improving the intestines and stabilizing the acidity of the stomach, but also turning milk into other valuable products.
As you can see, the difference between pasteurized and sterilized milk is very obvious.
Which milk is better?
Finally, we turn to the last question - what is the best milk?
For most parameters - pasteurized. It has a number of important advantages. Of course, the most obvious one is the affordable price. This is due to a faster and cheaper method of production. For many buyers, cost is a powerful argument.
Moreover, such milk is more useful - this has already been mentioned above.
However, if you have, for example, a long trip or there is no opportunity to keep milk chilled, then it makes sense to give preference to a sterilized product. Yes, it is less useful and more expensive. But it is stored much longer and less demanding on conditions. In some cases, this is a very important advantage.
Conclusion
So we figured out how the pasteurized milk differs from sterilized milk. So, if necessary, you can easily decide which product is best suited for a particular situation.