🥛 Yak milk

Yak milk is the milk of the female yak, a large bovine of the high mountains of Asia, used for butter and cheese. The yak is the only bovine raised on a large scale high in the mountains of Central and South Asia: on the Tibetan Plateau, in the Himalayas, in Mongolia and in the Pamirs. For local people the yak provides milk, meat, wool and transport. According to the FAO, yak milk is very similar in basic composition to buffalo milk: it is fattier than cow’s milk (usually about 6–7%, sometimes up to 9%), contains more protein, and has 5 g less water per 100 g.

Yak milk has almost twice as much β-lactoglobulin as cow’s milk and 2–6 times more lactoferrin. In China, Nepal and Mongolia there are plants producing yak milk powder.

Yak milk is made into butter, used in Tibetan butter tea with salt, as well as yogurt and dried hard cheeses such as chhurpi, which keep for months without refrigeration. The high fat content of the milk matters in the cold highlands, where food is scarce and energy needs are high. The FAO classes the yak among the “niche” dairy animals of high mountains.