If you’ve been in a supermarket recently you will know that milk is no longer restricted to the white stuff that comes from a cow.
Today you can buy endless varieties of non-dairy ‘mylks’ – almond, oat, coconut, rice, hemp, and soya to name a few – which is great for vegans, lactose intolerants or just anyone looking to cut down on the d-stuff.
But now Whole Foods have heralded the arrival of pea milk in the UK for 2019, have we finally reached peak plant?
Pea milk (supposedly not the same as pea soup, but what do we know) is made from yellow split peas rather than garden peas, so it isn’t even green. These peas are naturally high in the amino acid lysine and a strong source of iron.
If that sounds healthy, pea milk also has 8g of protein per glass, eight times more than almond milk, plus 40% less sugar and double the calcium levels of cow’s.
It also claims to be better for the environment than other dairy alternatives – reportedly needing 100 times less water than almond milk to make. Bonus.
But we do have to ask, where do we draw the line?
Perhaps pea milk will be good for people who are allergic to nuts, soy, lactose and gluten (it’s free of all of them) – these are allergies that wipe out a lot of the current supermarket options. And it might save us all if we end up with a repeat of the oat milk crisis of 2018.
[Read More: Moo-Ve Over: 7 Dairy-Free Milk Alternatives]
But where does it end? Next thing you know we’ll be milking our mange tout and blending broccoli.