Casein was: Re: Smoking & Health

[Guest guest]

Hi,

They’re easy to find just doing a search for “goat milk a2”. You’ll get

lots of hits. I first started researching this nearly a year ago. Here’s a

copy of my first letter on the topic, written to the Nourishing Traditions

group – I’m sending it here because it still has some of them most thorough

information I’ve found – here’s a big blast of it…HTH…look forward to your

thoughts because I’ve been trying to post about this for nearly a year

trying to get discussions going and nada, zippo, zilch as far as

responses……:

This information is from Australia, a big to-do they went through back in

2002 and I’m still trying to figure out if/how they resolved it. It goes

something like this:

“Literature from the A2 Corporation presents the distinction between A1 and

A2 beta caseins. Both caseins are composed of a series of amino acids that

are linked together. Beta casein A2 has the amino acid proline in the 67th

position in its sequence of amino acids. In A1 the 67th position becomes

histidine, creating a different type of beta casein. When beta casein A1 is

digested, the amino acid chain is cut right before histidine at postition

67, releasing a fragment of seven amino acids called beta casomorphin 7

(BCM-7).

According to McLachlan, BCM-7 in A1 beta casein has been shown to influence

platelet aggregation and LDL oxidation, both factors in heart disease. Rats

injected with BCM-7 have exhibited symptoms characteristic of schizophenia.

BCM-7 has definitive opiate-like properties. “

This is part of my continuing research into my Autistic son’s

hallucinations, so I was intrigued by their BCM-7 claim. Also, not wanting

heart-disease, I’d like to further research this.

Truly, after reading the story at <http://www.vegparadise.com/news35.html>

http://www.vegparadise.com/news35.html, I have to wonder how much of the

Australian A-1, A-2 issue is corporate/business finagling vs. real health

concerns.

This is a part I find intriguing – that cows have different types of casein:

“According to McLachlan, ‘There are three types of casein in cow's milk,

called alpha, beta, and kappa. Each type comes in certain variants,

depending on the genetics of the cow that produced it. For example, more

than 70% of Guernsey cows produce the A2 variety of beta casein in their

milk, where 70% of Red Danish Dairy cattle produce the A1 variety of beta

casein.’ The researcher also pointed out that one cow could produce both A1

and A2 because it could receive different genes from the mother and father.

Black and white Friesian cows, very common in dairy herds in many countries,

have this combination of the two genes.”

Natch, the article IS at a vegetarian site, which has an anti-milk bias.

“Vegetarians in Paradise is puzzled by all of the hoopla about the benefits

of A2 milk. For years, vegetarians have been hearing about the dangers of

milk and how it is implicated in heart disease, breast and prostate cancer,

asthma, diabetes, autism, arthritis, and a host of other degenerative

diseases. What the A2 controversy does accomplish is calling attention to

the problems created by consuming dairy products. Perhaps, dairy is no

longer in the hallowed kingdom of health foods, but instead is a direct

cause of numerous human ailments. VIP would like to see more research before

the public embraces A2 milk. We have a feeling that A1 vs. A2 is not the

real issue. The real issue may be all casein present in all dairy products.”

Here’s some more recent stuff I’ve written about casein. This was message

#9788 which no one responded to – in response to someone’s questions about

casein in kefir which I did a bit of research on – it also included some

study of casein in cheese in which I’ve quoted sources talking about

cheesemaking breaking down casein.

Casein is what coagulates in the milk creating curds or a “gel” texture.

Casein is activated in kefir because of the acidic conditions. No acidic

conditions, no casein activated, therefore, no solidifying due to casein

proteins clumping together.

”What happens to milk during fermentation? Bacterial cultures are added to

pasteurized milk, which is incubated at 40° to 44°C for several hours.

During this time, the bacterial population grows and produces acid from

lactose, reducing the pH of the milk. This destabilizes the micellar casein,

coagulating the milk. When the target pH (generally 4.1 to 4.6) has been

reached, the product is cooled to slow fermentation.”

http://www.foodproductdesign.com/archive/2000/0300de.html

Casein is a protein - a number of proteins, in fact. Some of them help with

mineral absorption, etc., so they do have their good sides. Without

casein, there wouldn?t be cheese. Interesting, at least to me, when there’s

acidification, as in kefir, the negative charge is removed from the casein

micelles (protein particles) which allows coagulation. See this for every

detail you can imagine about how casein works in cheesemaking:

http://www.foodsci.uoguelph.ca/cheese/sectiond.htm

The only information I?ve ever been able to find about caseins is in

cheese-making. I don?t think there?s been enough study on fermented milk

products. In fact, there?s an online book I?ve been tempted to purchase

which provides a good history of the use and study of fermented products

(including kefir) but the basic gist looks like they’re suggesting “not

enough is known but it needs to be studied in more details”.

http://books.nap.edu/books/0309046858/html/R6.html

Anyway, caseins in cheese-making – the

www.foodsci.uoguelph.ca/cheese/sectiond.htm states: “During ripening

chymosin breaks down one of the caseins, namely s1-casein much more than

other caseins.” Again, “breaks down” doesn’t mean it isn’t available for

us to digest. It may simply mean it isn’t available in the coagulation

process. In fact, further down the page of this article, they talk about

increasing the temperature in the milk in order to “recover” the casein.

Abby at http://www.rejoiceinlife.com/media/mediaRelease/cultured.php

discusses fermenting breaking down casein, but I can’t find solid research

confirming this. Remember, casein isn’t a singlular molecule of protein - it

has multiple forms. Now, if she had said, “pre-digested” the casein, I could

find more room to agree. Pre-digested casein is called “casein hydrolysates”

and is used as a substitute for children who have food allergies.

For me, I’ve decided to focus on the TYPE of casein as being important, for

a wide variety of reasons. It appears there’s no way of necessarily

removing it unless you have a highly-processed technique. So I bring my

focus down to caseins commonly known as A-1 and. A-2. Some Guernsey milk is

the only cow milk that is A-2, the “safe” casein. All other cow milk

contains A-1 casein. A-1 is thought to be the culprit in heart disease. Goat

milk cotains A-2, no A-1. For this reason, we drink goat milk. Additionally,

for my Autistic son, A-2 casein will not form the opiate peptide,

casomorphin. His hallucinations have ceased since drinking goat milk. The

few times I’ve let him have cow milk (raw, from Jersey’s), he goes off into

make-believe-world-la-la-land for several days.

Another way I look at kefir and casein - kefir is high in natural enzymes.

It’s the enzymes that “break down” various proteins, sugars, etc., through

digestion. Enzymes called protease, break down various proteins into

peptides. Those can then be broken down by other protease enzymes into amino

acids. One of my favorite enzyme-study sites:

http://www.enzymestuff.com/basicswhichenzyme.htm

Does your particular kefir contain any, all, some of these enzymes? Don’t

know. Don’t know about mine either. There’s a lot of information about kefir

containing enzymes that break down lactose, but I’ve yet to find

confirmation about casein. Back to kefir =? I’m not even sure which good

bacteria and yeasts mine has. Yours may have some that mine don’t, etc. Yet

again, this is another reason I find it easier to focus on the type of

casein (A1 or A2) and let it go at that. For now.

-Sharon, NH

Deut 11:14 He will put grass in the fields for your cattle, and you will

have plenty to eat.

“Sharon, do you have any references for A2 versus A1. I am going to

write a milk primer for my website and the more ammo I have the

better.”

thanks,