When I was a kid, I was told I was allergic to milk. When I was a teenager, I realized nothing happened when I drank milk, so I drank milk to my heart's content, pints of the stuff every day. When I was in my mid-20s, I found that drinking milk starting giving me queasy, uncomfortable feelings. I cut back. I cut back more. Eventually, I stopped drinking any milk at all.
But every once in a while, I'll drink milk again, just to see if I'm still lactose intolerant.
I am.
I should really just try Lactaid - milk modified for the lactose intolerant. But I can't help thinking it's not "real" milk. The same way decaf is not "real" coffee. But it's just milk with a lactase enzyme added to break down lactose into simple sugars (glucose and galactose).
The lactase comes from fungi, and the process was developed in the 1980s by a scientist in the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Research Service (her work also led to the development of reduced fat mozzarella, which I am far less motivated to try).
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