FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
We have put together a list of the most common questions we receive to provide you with quick answers. If you can’t find what you are looking for, don’t hesitate to contact us for further assistance.
Buttermilk Blend – Lactose Content: 23 grams of dry Buttermilk Blend (enough powder for 1 cup of liquid buttermilk) contains 63.33% lactose. Because the Buttermilk Blend is used in cooking and baking and distributed among an entire recipe, most of our customers that have lactose-intolerence problems do not have trouble using the Buttermilk Blend. The amount of lactose from the Buttermilk Blend consumed in one piece of cake, for example, is very minimal.
Mix’n Drink – Lactose Content: 23 grams of dry Mix’n Drink (enough powder for 1 cup of milk) contains 52% lactose. Drinking a straight glass of milk gives you a high percentage of lactose and will cause problems with many lactose-intolerent people.
SACO Mix’n Drink and Buttermilk Blend are pasteurized. Pasteurization is a heat treatment for the milk which eliminates pathogenic bacteria that might be present. Very little milk is marketed raw because if a human consumes this bacteria, they are susceptible to what is called undulant fever, a chronic and debilitating disease characterized by intermittent fever, pain and swelling in the joints, and great weakness.
SACO Mix’n Drink and Buttermilk Blend are also homogenized. Homogenization is a process where the milk is forced through a pressure system to reduce the size of the fat globules, and eliminate visible separation of the fat particles. This is a standard process with any milk product.
SACO Buttermilk Blend
Whey is the byproduct of cheese making. To make cheese you start with pasteurized milk, add a lactic starter, then, once sufficient acidity is reached in the milk, an enzyme (generally rennin) is added to initiate the first step in the conversion to cheese. The gel or clot that eventually forms is cut into small pieces, which permits the liquid whey to drain from the curds. Whey increases the tenderness and improves the color in baked goods, which is why we add it to our Buttermilk Blend.
The amount of whey consumed, from the Buttermilk Blend, in one serving of any baked good made with the product, would be so minimal that it would more than likely not to cause any trouble for you, but the decision whether to use it or not lies with you.
The liquid buttermilk on today’s market, is made from only cultured skim milk, and contains not even one drop of real buttermilk. While it may work in recipes that call for buttermilk, as does soured milk, it does not provide the benefits of using real buttermilk.
SACO Cultured Buttermilk Blend is made from real buttermilk! When cream is agitated in a butter churn, the membranes around the fat globule membrane separate from the fat globule. This allows the butterfat to precipitate out in the form of butter. The phospholipids, meanwhile, remain in the fluid phase.
The fluid that remains, after all the butterfat has been removed as butter, is similar to skim milk except it contains the phospholipids and proteins from the fat globule membranes. These phospholipids are natural emulsifiers! When real buttermilk is used in a recipe, the presence of these emulsifiers results in finer dispersing of the shortening throughout the batter. The smaller air cells which form in the presence of the emulsifier make the grain of baked goods finer, the volume and texture superior. This is by far the most important advantage of using real buttermilk for cooking and baking.
SACO Powdered Milk
We do not specifically use BHA or BHT in the milk, however, these preservatives are used to maintain the shelf life of the added vitamins (A Palmitate & D3), which are put back into the milk to meet FDA requirements. These preservatives are often used in a variety of products because they are relatively stable to heat and maintain their effectiveness in cooked products (important with dry milk). They are most often used together because their combination is much more effective than if either is used singly. Their frequent use in the food supply raised concern about their safety, but after extensive review, they have been classified as GRAS (generally recognized as safe) substances. Since vitamins A & D are fat-soluble, skim and lowfat milks need to have these added back in.
Due to the fact that both of these vitamins are not shelf stable, and will decrease from the initial amount added, enough is added to make sure that what the consumer gets is within the FDA guidelines. An 8 ounce liquid serving of milk, made with the Mix’n Drink, contains between 506 and 1,173 IU’s of vitamin A, and 101-235 IU’s of vitamin D. Even though this sounds like a large range, it is not because IU’s are extremely small units.
SACO Cocoa Powder
Concerns regarding the caffeine in chocolate may not be as warranted as one might think. Actually, most of our chocolate items contain very little caffeine. To help one make the comparison, one cup of regular coffee contains 100-142 mg of caffeine. A cup of decaffeinated coffee contains approximately 4 mg of caffeine.
Baking Cocoa caffeine content: One serving of SACO Premium Cocoa (3 Tbsp. or 15 grams) contains 47 mg of caffeine. This is only about 1/3 of what you would get in a cup of regular coffee.
CHUNKS caffeine content: One entire 12 oz. bag of SACO Real Semi-Sweet Chocolate CHUNKS contains only 200 mg of caffeine. Dolci Frutta caffeine content: In a one ounce serving (30 grams, or 1/8th of the container), there is only 1.7 mg of caffeine, less than half a cup of decaffeinated coffee.
An interesting fact found in my research; one cup of coffee made in an automatic drip coffee maker contains 142 mg of caffeine. One cup made in an electric perk machine only contains 100 mg. Those of you looking to wake up better use those automatic drip coffee makers!
There are two types of baking cocoa; natural and Dutched. SACO’s Premium Cocoa is a blend of natural and Dutched cocoa. Dutched cocoa is European, and is the finest cocoa you can get. It increases the quality of the color, flavor, and texture of your baked goods. The acidity level in cocoa is based on a scale of 0 to 14 (0 being acidic, and 14 being less acidic, or alkali). A totally Dutched cocoa comes in at a level of about 7.5 on this scale. The problem with a fully Dutched cocoa is that most American recipes are based on using a natural cocoa, with a higher acidity level. The acidity in the natural cocoa (which scales in at about 5.8) contributes to the leavening of the baked product. If using a fully Dutched cocoa in these recipes, the acidity level may not be high enough to provide proper leavening. We blend the two cocoas to have the best of both worlds. We use enough Dutched cocoa to create the color, flavor, and texture advantage, but blend in enough natural cocoa to bring the acidity level back up to where it will work properly in all recipes (ours scales in at a level of about 6.4). In fact, since SACO Premium Cocoa is a blend, it can be used even in recipes calling for a fully Dutched cocoa. See scale below.