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The many uses for sour raw milk at home which, unlike pasteurized milk, does not go putrid, but naturally ferments into probiotic clabber.
One of the most frequent questions I get from readers is what to do with naturally soured milk, also called clabber.
Sour raw milk is quite unlike pasteurized milk that has gone past its “use by” date. Pasteurized milk goes putrid and must be thrown out at that point, but raw milk is still a highly useful item in the kitchen.
The difference is that pasteurized milk is quite literally a dead food. In other words, there are no enzymes or probiotics present. So, when store milk goes bad, it becomes a huge foodborne illness risk to consume it and it must be discarded.
Sour Raw Milk is Safe
Raw milk, on the other hand, is loaded with enzymes and probiotics. When raw milk starts to sour, it simply means that beneficial bacteria called probiotics have started to use up the lactose (milk sugar) which causes the milk to no longer taste as sweet.
Raw milk that tastes sour is still very much safe to drink and is even more beneficial to health as the higher level of probiotics initiates the fermentation or clabbering of the milk.
So if you find yourself with some soured raw milk in the refrigerator, check through this list and see what makes the most sense for using it up. It doesn’t have to be raw cow milk either. Any type of unpasteurized milk will do including sheep’s milk, goat milk, camel milk, and even water buffalo milk!
Whatever you do, though, don’t throw it out! There is no need for even a drop of your nutrient-dense, grass-fed dairy to go to waste!
There are so many uses for the clabber itself as well as the raw liquid whey separated from it.
Uses for Sour Milk (Clabber)
1. Make scrambled eggs with it.
2. Whip up a pan of quiche with it.
3. Add it to a breakfast smoothie.
4. Make homemade pudding with it (if slightly soured).
5. Make hot chocolate with it.
6. Use it for garden fertilizer (just pour around the base of your plants or trees). It really gets the worms going crazy.
7. Give it to your pet. Cats love it!
8. Make egg custard pudding with it.
9. Make this traditional British white sauce recipe with it.
10. Ferment homemade kefir with it.
11. Make yogurt with it.
12. Blend with flour to soak pancake batter.
13. Use it to soak cold breakfast cereal batter.
14. Use it to soak waffle batter.
15. Remove the soured cream off the top and add to homemade soups.
16. Remove the sour cream off the top and add to meatloaf.
17. Just drink it. It tastes like buttermilk and is very good for you.
18. Use to make devil’s food cake.
19. Make omelets with it.
20. Use it instead of water to cook up your soaked breakfast oatmeal.
21. Use it to soak crepe batter.
22. Soak banana bread batter with it.
23. Soak pumpkin bread batter with it.
24. Use it to soak buttermilk biscuit batter.
25. Soak muffin batter (any kind) with it.
26. Separate the liquid whey from the clabber.
27. Remove the sour cream off the top and add to a baked potato.
28. Add buttermilk culture and make buttermilk with it.
29. Take a bath in it. It was good enough for Cleopatra, right?
30. Separate out the liquid whey and make ricotta cheese.
31. Make mozzarella cheese with it.
32. Whip up a pan of flan using it instead of milk.
33. Make sweet potato casserole with the sour cream off the top.
34. Make cottage cheese with it.
35. Use as a base for ice milk (if only slightly soured).
36. Use it instead of evaporated milk to make pumpkin pie.
37. Use it to clear up pinkeye.
38. Soak frozen fish in it until thawed for improved texture and flavor.
39. Soak dull-looking silverware in it for at least 30 minutes and then rinse for a beautiful shine.
40. Use it as a conditioner for your hair. Or, take a bath in it. Remember Cleopatra?
41. Repair fine cracks in your china by boiling them in the soured raw milk (the milk reacts with a chemical in the china to seal the crack). I’ve never done this myself but it supposedly works.
42. Use it ice cold to soothe the discomfort of poison ivy.
43. Dab some on mild sunburn for instant, cooling relief.
44. Rub dry skin patches with it several times a day to make skin soft again.
45. Make cheese sauce for Welsh rarebit with it.
46. Make paneer (easy South Asian cheese that requires no rennet).
47. Make potato cheese soup.
48. Freeze the milk and use it later when you have a dire need for clabbered milk.
49. Make tapioca pudding with it.
50. Make bread pudding (soak the bread in the milk).
Need More Ideas? Let’s Keep Going…
51. Stew pork loin in it.
52. Make no-bake cheesecake with it.
53. Make lassi with it (Indian yogurt-style smoothie).
54. Use it instead of water (or a blend with water) to cook up amaranth porridge.
55. Separate the whey to use as a natural facial toner.
56. Use to cook up teff breakfast porridge.
57. Use blended with water to make cream of buckwheat porridge.
58. Make fermented almond milk.
59. Make homemade orangina soda.
60. Brew some detoxifying beet kvass.
61. Make homemade ginger ale.
62. Add a cup or two of the separated whey to a warm detoxifying bath instead of vinegar.
63. Make fermented lemonade.
64. Use instead of yogurt to make fermented potatoes.
65. Make homemade sauerkraut.
66. Use the separated whey instead of sauerkraut juice to make homemade pickles.
67. Make apricot butter.
68. Make probiotic mango chutney.
69. Use whey instead of raw ACV to make homemade mustard.
70. Use the whey to make fermented corn relish.
71. Blend up some probiotic thousand island dressing using some of the separated whey.
72. Make raw cream cheese.
73. Make fermented cilantro salsa.
74. Use whey to make homemade ketchup.
75. Add the whey to homemade mayo so it lasts three times as long in the fridge.
76. Add separated whey to potassium broth for extra minerals and digestibility.
77. Use to make cultured rice water.
78. Blend some to homemade wild rice milk to add probiotics.
79. Mix a teaspoon into a glass of homemade electrolyte beverage to add more minerals.
80. Use whey separated from clabber instead of kombucha to make a maple dijon salad dressing.
81. Stir a teaspoon of separated whey into homemade barbecue sauce to add probiotics.
82. Use liquid whey instead of raw ACV to make homemade cocktail sauce.
83. Use whey to make fermented salsa.
84. Substitute whey for lemon juice to make homemade steak sauce.
85. Whip up some homemade teriyaki sauce.
86. Add a drizzle of whey to artichoke dip to add probiotics and enhance the flavor.
87. Liquid whey is an important ingredient in hypoallergenic DIY baby formula.
88. Whey from clabber is also a key ingredient in homemade goat milk baby formula.
89. Add a drizzle of whey to sweet potato casserole baby food to add probiotics.
90. Liquid whey separated from clabber (or yogurt) is a key ingredient in homemade baby formula.
91. Use clabber blended with flour to make soaked waffles.
92. Whip up a pan of gluten-free soaked cornbread.
93. Make homemade tomato bisque using the soured milk instead of plain milk.
94. Use it to soak homemade quick oats.
95. Make a pan of Mexican mac & cheese.
96. Use instead of water to cook a pot of whole grain millet.
97. Make a buttermilk-style egg nog with it!
98. If only slightly sour, use it to make a refreshing matcha frappe.
99. Use as a substitute for water in this easy rice cakes recipe.
100. If only slightly sour, use to make a red rooibos latte.
101. Drizzle some into your cup of dandelion coffee if the sourness is very mild.
Do you have more suggestions to add? Please share with us in the comments section!
I’m sure there are literally dozens more uses for soured raw milk and the liquid whey separated from clabber that I’ve missed!
More Information
Organic UHT Milk
A1 vs A2 Milk
Why Skim Milk Makes You Fat
Low Temp (Vat) Pasteurized Milk Compared to Raw
My milk was going ‘sour’ in less than a week. I know the milk is still good but I am just not fond of that taste. I started to put an ice chest in my trunk on milk day and my milk stays fresher longer. Yummy.
Isabel, the reason your raw milk was going sour so quickly was exactly because of the way you were transporting it. Sweetie, you MUST use an ice chest AND ice packs inside the chest.
For ANYONE having to transport their raw milk more than LITERALLY from just across the road, use a cooler WITH ice packs!
I can’t tell you how many folks I see drive up to the raw milk dairy I go to, they buy 3, 4 or more gallons and they just put it into their car, and drive off – – I mean COME ON people!
I drive 50 miles one way to the JerseyGirl Dairy, outside of Winnsboro TX and on one of my first visits the owner was there, we introduced ourselves to one another and I told him I drive from outside of Commerce, TX, he noted that is a long way and thanked me for my patronage, as we chatted, he asked how many in my family, I told him just me and my husband. He then asked how many gallons I wanted so he could help me carry them out, I told him 5 gallons. He grabbed 4 out of the cooler, I got the 5th and when we got to my SUV and opened the back, he was DELIGHTED to see my great big igloo ice chest, and when he opened it saw the 11 various sized BLUE frozen ice packs. He could not say enough about how he wished everyone would be this smart about transporting their milk.
Raw Whole Milk needs to stay as close to 32 – 34 degrees as possible to stay fresh for the longest time. I told him that I store my raw milk gallons on the bottom shelf of my fridge (it is the coldest spot in there) and pushed all the way to the back. We have the fridge temp set on one of it’s coldest settings so my fresh raw milk lasts me and my husband (if we don’t drink it all first!) at least 14 days. I usually go back to the dairy the day before we run out and that is almost always on the 13 – 15 day mark. Like I said we drink it a LOT. Being just the two of us we don’t open and close the fridge door much. I know it is different with kids (I raised 6 🙂 so know about that) but with the milk on the bottom shelf and way in the back, even opening the door several times a day was not enough to shorten the raw milk “shelf life”.
Anyway, love this site, love this info and NOW have to get a bit more so that I can try some of the sour milk / clabber / curds / whey recipes . . . they look too yummy to resist!
get the book “super nutrition for babies”! Written by a holistic DR and nutritionist. It talks a lot about raw milk & of course how to feed ue baby 4 optimum health. order from amazon – it opened my eyes to all of this 🙂
Soak kidneys in them before preparing them for consumption.
@lisa – I am experiencing this as well, only I’m currently pregnant and my husband’s family keep saying things about it (including I might kill my baby because of listeria in the third trimester)…meanwhile they have no problem with their factory farmed bagged lettuce and cantaloupe which have been found to be tainted with listeria due to unhealthy farm practices. I just keep telling them…I know my farmer, I know how my cows are raised and there is a lot more accountability in that relationship that motivates farmers to keep their cows healthy. Does anyone who drinks pasturized milk even have a clue as to how their cows live? Fortunately my husband stands behind me, but you can tell they’re really pushing the issue with him because he keeps asking me about it. He, himself doesn’t really drink milk and you can tell he’s also weary of my milk, but right now, he’s supporting me. I just wish there was more supporting evidence, besides Weston price (his family says they’re the only ones who have all this bogus info supporting it) for its safety, but the scientific studies aren’t out there because there’s no money to be made from it. 🙁
I’m lucky my partner milks on a dairy farm and is an advocate of raw milk for young, old, pregnant and not pregnant because I have no intention of giving it up during pregnancy. He’s also a qualified cheesemaker and noted a that there seemed to be a correlation between women in the cheese factory exposed to the penicillin [used for the camembert/brie mould] and miscarriage [the women kept miscarrying but once removed from penicillin exposure they went on to have healthy pregnancies].
@Lisa: Sounds like they need to be “deprogrammed”. Have you ever read the book “The Untold Story of Milk” by Dr. Ron Schmid? It’s a great book. Get them to read it, and I think it could open up their eyes.
It just frustrates me, I know how good it is for you. His mother was like only an idiot would drink raw milk
Lisa just pour the raw milk in the store milk container. 😉
Funny, my kids thrive on raw milk and are sick a LOT less than most other kids. I put tgem on pasteurized milk and all sorts of health problems start!
My husband and his mother sent me CDC clips of how bad raw milk is and we had a huge issue over this it went to how would you feel if you killed your boys bc of giving them raw milk.. So I drink it and I know my kids are missing out on the health benefits
I know I’ll have to go through something like this if my babe and I have children. I love raw milk but he’s totally against the whole raw foods movement!
I soak my liver in raw milk to remove some of the iron flavor and tenderize it. The calcium binds to the iron in the blood to take that distinctive “liver flavor” that some find unpalatable.