Milk, Human Breast - Serious Question

[Wateetons]

(dear moderator: please do not delete this post, it's a serious question)

Friends,
A friend donated about 1,5 liters of her breastmilk. I really want to make cheese out of it, because, well it would be interesting and I like to try new stuff. Also, I'm writing a cookbook in which cheesemaking will be covered and this would make a interesting discussiontopic.  However,  making breastmilk cheese is notoriously difficult (see http://www.indrani.net/index.php?q=2006/03/breast_milk_cheese for a failure). The reason being it's low on proteine and the proteins are different than in cow's milk. I've been trying to make cheese out of store bought baby's milk for weeks, i don't want to waste my precious batch, and have not succeded. I added milkpowder to the baby's milk to increase the protein levels, to no avail. It gives a very bad break. Adding bodybuilder's Whey Protein did work, a little bit. Any clues on how to make this work?

[wharris]

why would you want to?  I gotta say it would creep me out.

[cmharris6002]

Along with  lower protein you also have substantially lower calcium levels (34mg/100g as opposed to 120mg/100g in goat milk) and you will need to compensate for the effects of freezing the milk. 

I suggest adding calcium chloride. You should expect that the curd will still be extremely fragile. I am not sure how to make cheese from commercial infant formula or if it is an adequate trial for you intended project.

[zenith1]

I agree with Wayne-feed it to the baby!

[Wateetons]

Thanks guys, I will add the Cacl2. Have done so using commercial babymilk as well, which I practiced on.
I'll keep you updated. (except for Wayne

[DeejayDebi]

Well if you not opposed to adding things to the milk  how about checking into carnation instant milk powder?

[Tea]

Someone else asked this question quite some time back, as their child was very lactose intolerant.  I say, give it a go.  Do what has been recommended here, and see what happens.  Freezing unfortunately always compromises the milk quality.  The other fellow never reported what the final results were, but I would love to know.
I had a friend that when cooking for her child used to just bare all standing at the stove and express away into the saucepan while cooking.  Almost fainted the first time I saw it.   

[DeejayDebi]

Well they claim it's the best thing with all the antibodies etc. I know my son was perfectly healthy until after I switched him to store bought powdered milk he got sick after a only a month. I don't think it's a cawinkydink!

[FRANCOIS]

Add skim milk powder to even your protein/fat ratio and double the CaCl dose.  I assume you have frozen this milk? Unless it is incredibly high in fat (like 9 or 10%) you may not be bale to thaw it and make anything but glop with it.

[Wateetons]

making it as we speak

[Wateetons]

Superprisingly, it worked. I must have experimented with a least 5 litres (in 500 ml batches) of supermarket babymilk, all of which failed. But the real stuff worked. I'll post some pictures tomorrow, but basicly I add LOTS of CaCl2 and rennet as well as enough powdered milk to raise the proteincontent to about 5%. Then I waited 2 hours for it to coagulate, break was moderate to OK, I cut it and heated it up to 45 degrees celcius before touching the curd. This firmed it up enough so that I could slowly mix it. Curds were good and quite firm.

one well, minor, problem: the milk seems to have gone bad in the freezer. 
The smell is quite unappatizing, not soury, but definately off. So as an experiment it seems to have worked, but not as an actual edible product.

[DeejayDebi]

Well that's disappointing but ...some cheeses taste better with age. Hang in there. The odd taste could be the powdered milk maybe? I can't say that I have any idea what breast milk tastes like. I was curious but never had the nerve to try it.

[Wateetons]

I'll keep it for sure. However, I have tasted it before and it's fatty and sweet, but definately milkish. Furthermore, I expect babymilk and breastmilk should taste alike for babies to drink both. This breastmilk just had a strange odor to it, it reminds me of the time my fresh hogscasing for sausages had gone bad. Not good. Definately not the powdered milk.

[Tea]

CaCl2 also tastes horrible, so when you say you added LOTS, let hope that it wasn't too much.

Great to hear that if worked though.

[hplace]

The instructor of a cheese class I attended said that it is impossible to make cheese with human breast milk. He said he had tried making cheese with all kinds of milk including whale milk, but human milk won't work. He was trying it because of the people allergic to all kinds of milk except human and wanted to eat cheese.