How to choose a real sour cream

Sour cream gives our body protein, normalizes intestinal microflora and restores power. However, only if it is... Alas, to many a modern cream products are not affected. Often on the shelves you can find a jar, the contents of which consist of vegetable fat, dry milk, thickeners and stabilizers.

Sour cream is one of the few products to which the West added the definition of "Russian" and treated with great reverence. It is called "Russian cream" and "main lubricant Russian cuisine" (from the book by Peter Weill and Alexander Genis). However, this is not surprising: in Europe and America the right cream can not do it.





The worst thing is that in our country also gradually begin to forget the classic recipe. After all natural sour cream – not just a dairy product obtained by fermenting cream with a starter culture of special microorganisms. After this stage of production it still needs at least a day to ripen under special conditions, acquiring his famous consistency and unique taste. However, a natural product very capricious, moreover, it is "live" and quickly deteriorates. That's why manufacturers strongly want to simplify and speed up the process, reduce the cost of the ingredients and to ensure that cream for months, it was "fresh" on store shelves. What are they doing for this? Instead of cream and yeast add the dry milk, palm oil or soy protein. For sealing the fermented product using starch, carrageenan and other thickeners. preservatives. As a result, the stores among the jars of cream are natural and its counterparts.

100% naturalBefore you buy the product, train yourself to read information that is written on the packaging. The only way you will be able to distinguish a natural product from the surrogate. So, quality creamy sour cream called "smetana". This applies to imported and domestic product. Well, if the latter is still the standard. However, the perfect sour cream is one which includes only cream and sourdough. Any other additive components, even just milk, and even more dry, making it less quality (although the standard is valid). By the way, statements like "100% natural" or "Thick – the spoon stands" should be treated with healthy skepticism. Similar phrases manufacturers like to use whatever the essence of the product, because they are not regulated by law.

In addition, always pay attention to the expiration date of sour cream. Well, if it can be stored for more than 14 days, because this product is the most "alive" and the classic.

Sour cream is not sour creamIf the label specified is not "sour cream" and "sour cream product", it means the Bank is non-natural product – however, this phrase typically write small and in an inconspicuous place, so you'll have to look for it. More coarsely on the package indicate something diminutive like "sour cream" or "matanoski". Despite the fact that such titles are forbidden, some manufacturers still continue to use them.

For the production technology of cream the product is similar with natural – he, too, is in the process of fermentation, but part of it is completely different. Cream it can be in small amount or absent. But everything else is cheap vegetable fats of various components of milk, thickeners, and stabilizers in bulk, therefore, stored it for several months. As you know, the usefulness of different "smetana" due to the large amount of chemical additives is a big question.

Spoon worth? It's not important!Good cream – the one in which there is a spoon, I believe many Housewives are wrong, because today, the quality index is very outdated. Thickeners and stabilizers that modern manufacturers are actively added to the product, connect the water, so the spoon does not sink in it. Now it is better to use other people's quality control. If the sour cream to pour from one jar into another, it must form a "hill", which slowly fade "the waves", and they are gradually aligned to the horizontal surface. But the product with thickeners when shifting into another container will go lumpy, not spreading, or soon will prostrate is dependent on its fat content. But "slides" with the "waves" chemical sour cream should never do.

White, glossy, deliciousAbout the quality of the sour cream can tell its appearance. The color should be white with a light cream color and uniform throughout the mass. There are no lumps and irregularities. The surface is good product must be perfectly smooth, glossy and shiny. If you have opened the jar and saw a pale cream matte, then most likely it is full of thickeners.

The taste of the natural product of pure milk. Sharp acidity suggests that the cream begins to deteriorate, and if it is made from recombined cream or with addition of dry milk, you may receive the taste of melted butter. However, a more important characteristic of a natural product is even, and not a taste sensation on the tongue – sour cream should like to envelop. If it is a lump or spread, it is not the best product.

Almost good fatcream is a different fat content from 10% to 58%. Therefore, it is divided into the following types: low fat (10, 12 and 14%), low-fat (15, 17, 19%), classical (20, 22, 25, 28, 30, 32, 34%), fat (35, 37, 40, 42, 45, 48%) and full-fat (50, 52, 55, 58%). Want to buy sour cream for a hearty salad or cream to a cake – choose a caloric instance, don't want to fear fat or cholesterol – buy product with a low percentage. However, in recent years the attitude of scientists to milk fat has changed. Fully healthy they still do not call, but they have found a useful substance is conjugated linoleic acid, or CLA. Doctors have scientific data that allows us to think that they can inhibit the development of obesity, to facilitate weight loss during the diet, reduce the risk of vascular disease and enhance immunity.

The opinion of the expertKonstantin Spahiu, doctor-gastroenterologist, candidate of medical Sciences:sour Cream not the dietary product, because it has saturated fats that help the development of atherosclerosis. But to demonize her because of it, not worth it. Sour refers to those products that we consume in small amounts – one or two tablespoons in a salad and same soup. If you take 20%, so with it will eat a little more than 3 g of fat. This is less than 5% of the daily value of dietary fat for women.

The perfect sour cream

1. Called "sour cream".


2. GOST is made only from cream and sourdough.

3. The packaging says: "the Number of lactic acid microorganisms at the end of the shelf life of the product – at least 1х107 CFU/g.

4. Storage life – not more than 2 weeks.

5. Color – white with light cream tint, uniform throughout the mass, without lumps.

6. The surface is shiny.

7. Taste – a clean dairy.

8. When pouring forms a "hill", which slowly fade the "wave". published

Author: Alexander Melnikov

 

P. S. And remember, only by changing their consumption — together we change the world! ©

Source: www.aif.ru/food/products/16043

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