Patty Sullivan of Catonsville is stumped by the dairy case. One kind of milk promises to make her children smarter. Another claims to come from healthier cows. Unable to sort all that out, she reaches for good old, conventional Costco milk."I find it very confusing," said Sullivan, who picks up five gallons a week for the Burtonsville preschool she runs. "You need a research degree to find out the differences. And is it really that much better for you?"
Not long ago, consumers only had to ponder one thing before hefting a gallon jug into the shopping cart: How much fat did they want? Then, more than a decade ago, organic started showing up in ordinary supermarkets.
Today, the world of milk is even more rarefied - and more confusing, because the milk trucks are moving more quickly than the science. Researchers can't even agree if milk "does a body good," much less which kind is best. While consumers can have their pick of more milk varieties than ever before, they also have more questions about a product considered to be a cornerstone of childhood nutrition - one that each American, on average, slurps down at a rate of 24 gallons a year.
There's milk from grass-fed cows, said to be more nutritious and better for the environment. Milk with added omega-3 fatty acids, touted as boosting brain function. Nonhomogenized milk that fans are willing to shake before drinking - in glass bottles, no less - on the premise that their bodies won't absorb as much fat if it hasn't been blasted into tiny bits.
Ultra-pasteurized. Low-pasteurized. And unpasteurized "raw" milk, whose devotees are so convinced of its superior health benefits that they'll travel from Maryland, where sales are outlawed, to Pennsylvania, where it's legit.
With soy, rice and almond milks suddenly mainstream fare, the dairy case has become more crowded than a feedlot. The grocer's got milk, all right, even in a troubled economy that reportedly has milk sales slumping.
None of it is cheap.
While Sullivan spent about $2.25 a gallon for that conventional milk at Costco, Wendy Johnson, a special-education teacher from Hanover, pays more than twice as much for organic. She shells out even more - about $14 a gallon - for individual, juice box-like containers of organic milk for when the family's on the go.
Johnson figures organic is best for her 5-year-old daughter, but she has some doubts, precisely because of those handy little "shelf-stable" boxes that don't need refrigeration.
