Pasteurization of Milk through Direct Heating up to 75°C over Kitchen Stove at Home

Pasteurization remains as an important process that makes milk safe from pathogens and increases milk's shelf life without altering the taste and the nutritional value. But, still many people drink unpasteurized milk either because people do not know how to pasteurize the raw milk at home, or because they prefer minimally processed food. Herein, we demonstrated that simply heating milk over a kitchen stove up to 65° C can produce pasteurized quality of milk by reducing the total number of bacteria within the limit (<20,000 CFU.mL-1) of U.S. Grade “A” Pasteurized Milk Ordinance, killing pathogens like coliforms, E. coli, Vibrio, Salmonella, Lactobacillus spp., Pseudomonas and Staphylococcus aureus etc., inactivating milk's endogenous heat-resistant alkaline phosphatase (ALP), and extending milk's shelf life similar to pasteurized milk. However, heating milk to 75°C showed greater effectiveness in killing pathogens than that of standard pasteurization (62.5°C for 30 min). Importantly, the key nutritional elements of milk including total protein, lipid, lactose, vitamin B2 and calcium remained protected even at 75°C. Thus, simply heating milk on a kitchen stove up to 65°C-75°C has been shown quick, cost-effective, an energy-saving in-home pasteurization technique to produce safe and nourishing milk with increased shelf life.