[Nǎi - "Nye"]
Hope everyone had a great milk day. The word specifically for what one refers to as milk in English is 牛奶 [Niúnǎi - "Nyoo Nye", Literally: Cow Milk]. The origin for the character can be read from the two radicals that create it, themselves characters. 女 [Nǚ - "Nü"] on the left means "woman" and on the right 乃 [Nǎi - "Nye"] meant in ancient china "pregnant woman" and depicts a profile view of breasts and belly. Today, pregnant is written as 孕 [Yùn - "Yoon"] and is the same profile of a pregnant woman, but this time with a child, 子 [Zi - "Zeh"].
奶 can also be used as a term of respect for a married woman similar to "Misses" or as a derogatory term for a mistress of a married man 二奶 [Èrnǎi - "'R' Nye", Literally: 2nd Milk]. Doubled as 奶奶, it is the name you would use for your paternal grandmother.
Milk in China is a somewhat more rare commodity than in the US. Dairy departments in general are rather smaller than you would be used to, and most if not all of the butter and cheese are imported from Europe. A normal amount and price for milk is 15元/qt. (or more) corresponding to around $10/gal. As you can imagine, with 1,370,536,875 people the ratio of cows to people becomes quite low and most of this production goes towards infant formula.
The reason there isn't more market for adult dairy is...
The reason there isn't more market for adult dairy is...
Lactase persistence. This is the continued activity of the enzyme lactase, which processes lactose, into adulthood. This is also known as lactose intolerance. Lactose is a protein prevalent in milk and the ability to digest it is essential to mammal infants.
The ability to consume and digest lactose into adulthood is a recent evolution in few human populations. Only after animal domestication was there positive pressure for a lactase persistence mutation, and it arose in significant frequencies around 7,500 years ago in the Balkan Peninsula and Central Europe. It arose separately in the Near East, Sub-Saharan Africa, and the Asian Steppes.
In general, most of the world is unable to digest lactose with estimates at around 75% of world adults. Those without lactase persistence may be able to consume small quantities of milk products, but in general will experience digestive problems if larger quantities are consumed.
Northern European populations have around 95% lactase persistence in adults. Chinese populations have the opposite, around 5% lactase persistence in adults. This has led to a culture that has developed without dairy products for most of its history, and therefore has low modern consumption outside of infancy.
However, the Chinese dairy market in general has also taken a fairly recent hit in sales caused by mistrust of quality.
In late 2008, nearly 300,000 babies were sickened with 6 confirmed deaths as a result of milk tainted with the chemical melamine. Melamine causes kidney and urinary problems in humans and is universally banned in food production. Milk adulterated with melamine will have higher test levels of protein, which is how milk products are generally graded on quality.
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| These two are from the same brand, but the one on the right assures no added chemicals for twice the price. |
In most cases, dairy farmers were sold "protein powder" by salespersons which will increase the protein levels of their milk production to ensure their milk was not rejected by collection stations, but were unwittingly tainting the milk. One company, Sanlu [三鹿, Literally: Three Deer], was complacent in the adulteration and unresponsive to complaints. Eventually, several top executives of Sanlu were charged and imprisoned and a few producers of melamine were executed.
You can get more details from Wikipedia:
Suffice to say that the average Chinese citizen had their faith in dairy severely wracked after this. Searching for alternatives...
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| Or Walnut milk? |
Soybean milk received a surge in interest. Now, you may be familiar with Soymilk, but this is a different product than you may be used to. Soybean milk is made by griding dry soybeans with water to create an emulsion similar to cow milk. Soymilk as usually known in the US, is soybean milk that contains additives to make it taste as indistinguishable from cow milk as possible. Soymilk attempts to recreate everything about cow milk for consumers that for health or personal reasons can not consume cow milk. Soybean milk only has a visual similarity and vague taste similarity to cow milk. I mean, it obviously tastes just like soybeans.
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| ~$66 |
You can buy soybean milk pretty readily almost any store or restaurant, or buy a machine to make your own at home. To use a soybean milk maker, you only need to wash and (optionally) soak the beans then add them to the machine and start. The machine will cycle through heating and blending the beans and the final product will be a hot, frothy, delicious[?] batch of soybean milk.
Now if you are looking for something to consume your milk (soy or cow) with, you may be thinking of products fairly ubiquitous in the western world. However, cereal has been relegated to a pittance of a presence next to oatmeal and other porridge, likely at great cost to the companies attempting to break into the Chinese market, and ingredients for PB&J are in no better a situation.
Both peanut butter and jams (sorry, no jelly) are shoehorned in next to the mighty presence of honey. There are no less than 6 varieties, not brands, of honey, but only two brands of peanut butter. Skippy and Great Value, crunchy and smooth. Jams at least have a few surprising varieties; e.g. pineapple. Sliced white bread is equally hard to locate, and appears to be only available in groups of six to eight slices for roughly a dollar.
If you thought instead about cookies, you're in luck. Specifically about...
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| Expensive in the US? Try $4.65 for 9 oz. |
Now if you are looking for something to consume your milk (soy or cow) with, you may be thinking of products fairly ubiquitous in the western world. However, cereal has been relegated to a pittance of a presence next to oatmeal and other porridge, likely at great cost to the companies attempting to break into the Chinese market, and ingredients for PB&J are in no better a situation.
Both peanut butter and jams (sorry, no jelly) are shoehorned in next to the mighty presence of honey. There are no less than 6 varieties, not brands, of honey, but only two brands of peanut butter. Skippy and Great Value, crunchy and smooth. Jams at least have a few surprising varieties; e.g. pineapple. Sliced white bread is equally hard to locate, and appears to be only available in groups of six to eight slices for roughly a dollar.
If you thought instead about cookies, you're in luck. Specifically about...
Oreos. A slogan of Oreos was once "Milk's favorite cookie", but an apt slogan today would be "China's favorite cookie" because, well, it is. After a rough start and almost giving up, Oreo reformulated it's cookies for China and is now the leading seller in the country. The chocolate cookies taste less terrible and actually nice, and the creme is less waxy and unfortunately less sweet. I also felt they were more crispy and had a lot less tendency to cake on every surface of my teeth.
The presence of Oreos here is really quite surprising, and constitutes a majority of the aisle-space of Wal-mart, the remaining products majority imitators. However in a local snack store, I don't recall seeing them at all.
I'm a bit out of touch on Oreo varieties available in the US, but I would bet that the selection in China exceeds it. There's original, chocolate, strawberry, raspberry, bananna, whipped tea, whipped vanilla, birthday cake, raspberry/blueberry, grape/peach, orange/mango, vanilla cookie, vanilla cookie chocolate, vanilla cookie strawberry, as well as 3 types of soft cookies and 8 types of wafer cookies.
Perhaps next I can write about something outside of the grocery...
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