The nutrition of buffalo milk: a comparison with cow milk

Tongxiang Yang1a, Fang Wang1, Hong Li1, Qingsu Liu1, Quanyang Li1b 1 College of Light Industry and Food Engineering, Guangxi University, Nanning 530 004, P. R. China

atxyamy@163.com, bliquangyang@163.com,

Keywords: Milk nutrition, Buffalo milk, Yogurt, Syneresis, Water-holding capacity

Abstract. Milk is the essential source of nutrition for young mammals before they are able to digest other types of food. To explore the complex nutritive value of buffalo milk, the general composition, buffer capacity, the properties of buffalo yogurt were analyzed, meanwhile, cow milk as a control group was also studied. The results show that the nutritional value of buffalo milk is higher than that of cow milk, exhibiting the high protein, fat, lactose, total solids and nonfat solids contents, and the high buffer capacity. Yogurt with the probiotics characterized by acidification activity, syneresis and water-holding capacity, has the functional of lactobacillus resisting lactose intolerance and reducing constipation. Buffalo yogurt shows the higher stability and nutritional value.

Introduction

Milk components effectively affects the nutritive value and the technological characteristics [1, 2]. Such as, fat composition [1], β-lactoglobulin [2], caseins size distribution [3-5]. Recently, some researchers found that the dry matter content of buffalo milk was higher than that of cow milk [1, 6, 7]. However, little is known about the nutritional value of milk technology characteristic.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization, buffalo milk production was estimated at 90 million metric tons [8]. China is rich in buffalo resources and Chinese government has already paid much more attention to the buffalo industry and taken active support policy for it. In recent years, buffalo has been rapidly developed as milk producer in China [9]. It is necessary to develop buffalo industry, especially in fermented products (yogurt) with the functional of lactobacillus resisting lactose intolerance and reducing constipation.

Compared with cow milk products, buffalo milk with high total solids is lack of fermented products. Therefore, this work is to explore the nutritional value of Chinese buffalo milk and yogurt. The technology characteristics of the buffalo milk and yogurt textural properties were studied, cow milk as a control group was also studied.

Materials and methods

Materials Fresh milk samples of buffalo and Cow were collected from Wutang farm in Nanning, Guangxi,

China. Reagents were all of analytical grade. Nutrition of buffalo milk

General composition analysis. Milk fat and crude protein content were determined by the Babcock, and Kjeldahl methods, respectively. Lactose was determined by colorimetric method according to the Chinese standard method (GB 5413.5-2010). Total solids were determined by conventional ovendrying (60 °C for 2-3 h, then 100 °C for 6 h) of 5 g milk sample. The pH was measured using a Microcomputer pH meter (Sartorius Instruments, Germany), calibration was done with buffers of pH 4.00 and pH 6.80.

Buffer capacity analysis. The buffering capacity was measured according to Van Slyke with some modifications [10]. 100 mL milk was slowly added with 0.1 M HCl or 0.1 M NaOH under vigorous stirring (25 ± 1°C). Nutrition of buffalo yogurt

Milk was standardized before it was preheated to 65 °C and homogenized at 20 MPa. The mixture was heated at 95 °C for 5 min. Samples were inoculated with the yogurt starter (3% inoculation rate) after cooled to 43 °C in the ice water. Inoculated samples were poured into cups and incubated at 41.8 °C until the acidity reached 80 °T.

Advanced Materials Research Vols. 781-784 (2013) pp 1460-1463Online available since 2013/Sep/04 at www.scientific.net© (2013) Trans Tech Publications, Switzerlanddoi:10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMR.781-784.1460

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Acidification activity measurement. 10 mL inoculated milk diluted with 20 mL distilled water

was titrated with 0.1 M NaOH solution using 0.5% phenolphthalein indicator. The result multiplied

by 10 was the acidity (°T) of 100 mL buffalo milk.

Syneresis (STS) measurement. The STS was determined according to the drainage method

reported by Hassan [11]. Briefly, STS (mL/100 mL) was expressed as the volume of acid whey

collected after 2 h refrigeration. All tests were done in triplicate.

Water-holding capacity (WHC) analysis. The WHC of fermented milk was determined as

described by Doleyres et al. [12]. 15 g sample was centrifuged for 3250 × g at 4 °C for 10 min. The

whey expelled was removed and weighed.

Results and discussion

General nutritional value. The general composition of two types of milk were significantly

different (Table 1). Buffalo milk had higher contents of fat (7.76 ± 0.48% v/v) and protein (4.91 ±

0.10% w/w) than cow milk, which are slightly higher than that described by Ménard et al.[5].

Meanwhile, non-fat content (10.52 ± 0.25% w/w) from buffalo milk was also significantly (P<0.05)

higher than that from cow milk. It indicated that buffalo milk has a higher nutritive value.

Table 1-Chemical composition of samples

Sample Fat(% v/v) Protein

(% w/w)

Total solids

(% w/w)

Nonfat solids

(% w/w)

Holstein milk 3.35±0.31* 3.06±0.06 11.81±0.33 8.41±0.42

Buffalo milk 7.76±0.48 4.91±0.10 18.44±0.71 10.52±0.25

* Means ± SD.

Acidification of milk is related to the total solids content [4]. Buffalo and cow acidification was

studied by analysis of variance. As shown in Fig. 1, the pH of buffalo milk decreased more slowly

than that of cow milk during acidification. The different buffer capacities were probably related to the

higher casein content in buffalo milk as the buffer properties of milk are reportedly related to their

composition of acido-basic compounds, calcium phosphate, and phosphorylation of casein [13]. The

protein content and molecular organization would play an important role in buffering capacity since

inorganic phosphate also contributes to the buffering capacity [4].

0 10 20 30 40

5.0

5.5

6.0

6.5 Holstein milk

Buffalo milk

pH

Volume (mL)

0 1 2 3 4 54.0

4.5

5.0

5.5

6.0

6.5

pH

Time (h)

Holstein yogurt

Buffalo yogurt

Fig. 1 Buffer capacity of acidified milk samples. Fig. 2 Acidification activity of yogurts.

Advanced Materials Research Vols. 781-784 1461

Nutritive value of two kinds of yogurts

Acidification activity of two kinds of yogurts. The acidification of two kinds of milk were

fermented under the same conditions shown in Fig.2. There were differences between milk

acidification rate of buffalo and cow milk yogurt. In the prophase fermentation, the pH value of cow

milk decreased faster than buffalo milk yogurt. Acidification rate of both yogurts were basically same

around pH5.5. However, the acidification rate of cow milk yogurt was slightly quickly than buffalo

milk again when the pH was lower than 5. These results indicated that the acidification rate was

related to the milk solids content. In fact, buffalo milk contains much more buffer material, which

makes its acidification more slowly [14].

Syneresis of two kinds of yogurts. STS is the combining capacity of yogurt gelatin to dairy

ingredients particularly moisture content, including the free water combined with union hydrogel

three-dimensional network. The smaller STS means the less whey exudate. Moreover, it also

illustrated that stability of clot in the stirring, filling, transportation and the sales process was better

with the smaller STS. It is shown that the STS of buffalo milk yogurts was lower than that of cow

yogurt (Fig. 3). STS of buffalo yogurt occupied 47% STS of cow yogurt. This could be because of the

high content of proteins and fats in the coagulum. These results demonstrated that STS of acid gel was

not only related to the conditions of processing, but also related to the kinds of solids and relative

proportions [15].

Holstein Buffalo

0.0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

Syneresis of yogurts

Holstein Buffalo0.0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

Water-holding capacity of yogurts Fig. 3 Syneresis of two kinds of yogurts. Fig. 4 Water-holding capacity of two kinds of yogurts.

Water-holding capacity (WHC) of two kinds of yogurts WHC measurements showed the difference between buffalo and cow yogurt samples (Fig. 4). WHC of buffalo yogurts was 1.2 times higher than that of yogurt made from Cow milk. It is definitely implied that physical properties of yogurt was not only affected by solid content, but also the kinds of milk. These results indicated that the stability of buffalo milk yogurt gel was higher than that made from Cow milk. The gel system forms a three-dimensional network structure with EPS added, and has good ability to retain moisture due to the interaction effect between milk proteins and EPS. However, with the increase of EPS content, the pore structure is relatively loose, and thus WHC decreased slightly. It also may be the result of calcium fortified [16].

Conclusion

Buffalo milk has the high nutritive value compared with cow milk. The protein, fat, lactose, total solids and nonfat solids contents of buffalo milk were higher than those of cow milk, so did the buffer capacity.

Buffalo yogurt exhibits the high nutritional value for the high protein and total solid contents and

the better stability. The stability of buffalo milk yogurt gel showed a higher than that made from Cow

milk via the lower STS and the higher WHC.

1462 Advances in Chemical Engineering III

Acknowledgements

The authors are thankful for the financial support provided by the National Natural Science

Foundation of China (Grant No. 31071576),Talents Project of Guangxi University (Grant No.

XZL090325) and the Science Research and Technology Development Projects of Guangxi (Grant No.

101000009-5B). All authors also thanks for Sciwriting institute providing English writing help.

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