Milk - whole or skim?

by Emmett Hines
(Houston, TX)

Everyone in our house drinks skim milk so we pretty much never have whole milk on hand. Where I see "milk" as an ingredient, I rarely see any qualifier like "whole" or "skim" or "2%" etc. So, can I just blindly use our skim milk with impunity or is there some adjustment I should make or must I make a trip to the grocery store each time I see "milk"?


Chef Todd Says:
Emmett-
For most purposes, the difference in the percentage of fat in your milk will effect the final outcome very little.

If you're making a white sauce, the percent fat in the milk won't change the sauce that much. However, in baking, fat adds texture, flavor and crust color. You should generally use whole milk in most baked products. If you only have skim milk, increase the fat in the formula 5%. Otherwise, there isn't much difference.

Chef Todd.