Frothing
Overview
Milk tends to froth or foam easily but this tendency depends upon the composition of milk and the conditions during frothing. Frothing may be beneficial or undesirable depending on the temperature and conditions to which milk is subjected. Frothing of milk is beneficial when making Italian style coffee, where steam is injected into the milk to create a foam (Figure 1). Good frothing is also desirable in many types of ice cream mixes and some dairy desserts. Frothing, however, is not desirable in dairy processing plants, such as the operation of pumping cold milk. To date, it has not been possible to identify any clear and consistent association with milk quality, composition or processing conditions or even “seasonality” that may help in our understanding of this issue. Given the importance of the coffee milk market, this project aims to provide new technical strategies to overcome this particular problem by developing a fundamental understanding of milk frothing such that the frothing of liquid milk may be controlled.
Publications
2020
Xiong, X., Ho, M. T., Bhandari, B. & Bansal, N. (2020) Foaming properties of milk protein dispersions at different protein content and casein to whey protein ratios. International Dairy Journal 104758.
Ho, T. M., Bhandari, B. R. & Bansal, N. (2020) Book chapter - Influence of milk fat on foam formation, foam stability and functionality of aerated dairy products. In: Truong, T., Lopez, C., Prakash, S. & Bhandari, B. (Eds.) Dairy Fat Products and Functionality: Fundamental Science and Technology, Springer, ISBN 978-3-030-41661–4.
2018
Ho, T. M., Le, T. H. A., Yan, A., Bhandari, B. R., & Bansal, N. (2018) Foaming properties and foam structure of milk during storage. Food Research International, 116, 379–386. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodres.2018.08.051.