What Makes the BEST Nut Milk? | Almond Cow Review

Hey everyone, it's Caitlin and welcome to another video. In this video, I'm going to be reviewing two different machines that make homemade nut milk and giving you the pros and cons of each. So recently I have been all about the nut milk reviews. I just posted an ultimate guide to homemade nut milk on my blog where I gave a step-by-step process as well as 12 different nuts and seeds that you can use to make homemade non-dairy milk. And I did all of that in my high-speed blender, and I also share my Vitamix, which is the most standard way to make nut milk at home. You can see it in this little corner back here. I actually just made a fresh batch of nut milk in my Vitamix for this video. If you want to see a video process of how to make nut milk in your Vitamix, I also filmed a how to make almond milk video a few months ago. So I will link that here in the video and also in the description. Today, I'm just going to be showing you how this machine works, which is the Almond Cow. If you've never heard of it, it's supposed to be a more budget-friendly alternative to the Vitamix. And this thing is pretty compact and dense. You can store it on your countertop. It does look nice. And its purpose is to make nut and seed milk, and that's pretty much it. But in contrast to the Vitamix, which can range from around $290 to up to $700, this costs about $200, and it does have payment plans available on their website. So I did already write a complete blog post comparing the Almond Cow with my Vitamix. I will also link that in the description, but I wanted to film a video as well because I know some people are more visual learners and would rather see my review in a video. So generally speaking, the Vitamix is more widely available. It's available in a lot of retail stores as well as online. You can get it on their website as well as on Amazon, and I'm sure there are other retailers as well. Like I said, the refurbished Vitamix models start at around $290 to $300. So it definitely is more expensive than the Almond Cow, but that being said, it's also a lot more versatile. There are also payment plans available on the Vitamix website. That's all I'm gonna say about that for now. So now let's move on to the Almond Cow. The Almond Cow is this little machine right here, and it comes with a few different things, so I'll break it down. So this is the actual device. The blender, unlike the Vitamix, which is in the base of the container right there, is actually in the head. So you have this container, which will hold your milk as you're blending it, and then this is the head of the Almond Cow, which is pretty heavy. This part is actually the built-in metal strainer, which unscrews to reveal the blender base. Honestly, these blades are not sharp. I can touch them without getting nervous. I'm a little more nervous when it comes to buying my Vitamix. It kind of just looks like an immersion blender. So the process of the Almond Cow is that you soak nuts or seeds. It does recommend that you soak them. Then you place them in this metal strainer, attach it in here, fill this with water, and then plug it in using the removable charging cord, and then blend away. So the Almond Cow comes with this machine right here, as well as this little plastic draining cup, which allows you to place the blended nut pulp in here and further strain it without actually having to use a nut milk bag, the power cord, which I just mentioned, and then it also comes with some cleaning supplies because there is a fine grate on this. It's kind of honestly like a juicer. Comes with a toothbrush and a sponge, as well as a cute little guide on how to use it. And just for a quick comparison, the Vitamix comes with this container here, the blender base, which you can see back there. You've all seen a blender before. And the Vitamix also comes with a tamper, but you don't even use this for nut milk, so it's not really that necessary. The Almond Cow recommends using a cup of almonds. So I actually just soaked it right in here. I just filled this with water, but I put it in a separate thing just so you can see. It does expand to about two cups in volume. And the Almond Cow does have measuring cups, I guess, built into it, like half a cup and a cup. But obviously, the nuts are gonna grow as I soak them. So when I pour this back in, it's gonna be a lot higher than the actual one cup measurement. So I'm not really sure what they recommend, but I'm just going to go with this because it was one cup of dry nuts, and it does say use one dry cup and then soak it. So I have this, and now I need to attach it to my blender head. This is the first kind of problem that I have with the Almond Cow. I've also made oat milk in this, and it's really easy then to stick this in here. But as you can see, I have nuts in here, and I need to put this blender head in. So you kind of have to wiggle it in in order to get it to attach, which obviously in the Vitamix, you're just putting the nuts and the water in the blender and then blending it. So it's a little bit of an arm workout, but eventually, okay, eventually, like I said, you get it to close. So now I have this, and then the Almond Cow, you just fill this with water. There is a minimum and maximum fill line here. I already measured this. The minimum is five and a half cups, and the maximum is six and a half cups. So the Almond Cow definitely makes bigger batches of nut milk. Typically, I make four cup servings in my Vitamix, and I like how I can change the nut to water volume there a little bit more easily. But I'm going to go ahead and try to make the creamiest nut milk possible. So I'm going to put five and a half cups of water into one cup of nuts, and we'll see what happens. Okay, I filled this. Then you just attach the head on, and then you just plug the power cord in. I really do like how this is removable because you could easily pour out of this too. And it just slides in to this little slot right here. And then, you guys probably can't see it, but a little light comes up on the top of the head of the Almond Cow, and you just press it to start. So the way the Almond Cow works is it works in cycles. One cycle is about one minute long, and it alternates the blender spinning and the blender resting. So it blends, I'd say, probably about for half of that time, and the Almond Cow recommends blending for one to two cycles total. So I'll just show you a few cycles, and then I'll skip to the end. So you press it. And then it goes again. So the light blinks while it's running, and then it stops at the top. And then after it's done, you just pick this up and then place it into the strainer cup. And then it says to let it sit for about another 10 minutes or so. Jeez, I'm having a lot of problems. It's not that hard. That actually goes really easily. And you just let this sit for about 10 minutes or so to drain the pulp if you want so you can take the head off. But then in here, you have your freshly blended nut milk, so you can just remove the cord. And then pour this into your device. And the thing that I do like about this is it's really easy to just pour directly into. You don't have to strain it. And there's a little funnel here, so you don't need to use another funnel for the Vitamix. Okay, I went ahead and moved some things around. I detached the Almond Cow head from the nut pulp itself. And I just wanted to show you, so for cleanup, you just rinse this off. You rinse this device out. And then after 10 minutes has passed, you remove this and you can pour this extra liquid into your container again. And then you're going to use these cleaning supplies to scrub the inside of the metal strainer. So with the Vitamix, you need to clean the blender. And then it also requires an extra step because there's no built-in strainer. So you need to have a nut milk bag and you're going to squeeze the liquid out of the pulp. I like to do it into a glass bowl and then use a funnel to pour it into a mason jar. So there's definitely less items to clean with the Almond Cow versus the Vitamix. Honestly, at the end of the day, I think it takes about the same amount of time to clean. These nut milk bags are like a really fine mesh. And I find that when I flip it inside out, the pulp doesn't really stick to it at all. And it's pretty easy to clean out. You do have more dishes to clean though. But then for the Almond Cow, let me just move this out of the way. But with the Almond Cow, you do need to be really particular about cleaning this metal strainer and making sure you get all the nut pieces out. Otherwise, it's not going to work as well the next time and you don't want any pieces going moldy or anything in there. If you've had a juicer before, it's very, very similar. Another thing I will note is that if the Vitamix was made of metal, you would have this exact same problem. But water is definitely going to stain this over time. It even says in the instructions to wipe it dry with a cloth. Otherwise, it will stain. So it's just something you need to keep in mind when you clean it. But now I just mainly want to talk about the milks. So this almond milk is made from my Vitamix and I use half of a cup of nuts to four cups of water. And then this Almond Cow, I use one cup of nuts to five and a half cups of water. So I have more nuts per water ratio in this Almond Cow than the Vitamix. But if you look at the milks, I don't know how well you're going to be able to see it on camera. This one is definitely more translucent when I pour it. And this Vitamix is pretty thick and opaque. And the way the Vitamix works, it doesn't really work in cycles. I usually blend my nuts on high speed for 90 seconds. Whereas the Almond Cow is definitely blending it less, which would contribute to how much the nuts are being broken down and how much the nuts are actually melding with the water, if that makes sense. So I already poured some of the Vitamix milk here. Put this here, keep things consistent. They both do have that thicker layer of almond cream on the top, which is really good in lattes and stuff. But yeah, even as I pour this, I can tell it's just not as opaque, even though there's more nuts in this. I've already filmed this before, so I already knew this was going to happen. So that's why I was okay with using more nuts in this. I just wanted to prove my point. So this is the Vitamix and this is the Almond Cow. It's really not too much of a difference on camera, but you can see more in real life. When I stir this, it looks a lot more opaque and you can kind of see it's almost more like brown and translucent when I stir this one. Okay, now we're going to do our taste test. First up, I'll try the Vitamix. It's thick, it's creamy, it tastes like almonds. I usually use my Vitamix to make nut milk, so I'm pretty familiar with it. One thing I will say is the Vitamix heats up the nuts a lot more, but it is cooled down to room temperature now. But that being said, I never have nut milk that goes bad, but I think the Almond Cow, because it doesn't heat it as much, it would probably last longer in the fridge. But now we're going to try the Almond Cow. This still tastes good, but I just feel like personally, it's definitely not as thick as the Vitamix or as creamy, which is really interesting because there are supposed to be more nuts in here. I do want to say it doesn't taste bad and it definitely tastes better than store-bought almond milk, but it also still tastes a little watery, if I'm being honest. But this taste difference does make sense when we compare the almond pulp of the Almond Cow to the almond pulp of the Vitamix. Now, the Almond Cow definitely does not blend the almonds as much, so the resulting nut pulp is like really white and you can definitely see pieces of almonds in it. So I will eat some for you. Nut pulp is never a very good plane, but it's definitely more fibery than like eating almond butter and obviously it's more watery too, but it definitely still tastes like almonds and it's like there are little chunks of almonds in it. Now, the nut pulp for the Vitamix, it honestly like liquefies the almonds. This is definitely more compact and it's not as white. It's like dense and it's honestly just like the fiber and the skins from the almonds. And I have tried this before. It like literally drives your mouth. It's not just like almonds at all to me. It tastes like, like the texture to me, I think would be similar to just like eating protein powder straight up. So this is the nut pulp from the Almond Cow. As you can see, it almost resembles like coarse almond meal, which is really interesting to me. You could probably totally repurpose it for almond meal and recipes, but this, which is part of, it's not all of, but this is the nut pulp from the Vitamix. It's like really mushy. It's definitely not as wet. And like, look how brown this is compared to the Almond Cow. Like you can definitely see a difference there in terms of the color and the consistency. It's really smooth and sort of just like, I don't know, almost like Play-Doh. So ultimately when it comes down to it, I think that the Vitamix does make better creamier nut milk in terms of the amount of nuts that you're putting into the recipe. However, the nut pulp from the Vitamix is not as tasty and not as good to use in other recipes. So if you like making nut pulp granola or cookies or anything, you can definitely use the Vitamix nut pulp, but I think that this is more versatile. And I've even seen recipes where you can convert it back into almond meal. I honestly still think this is a really great option. If, for example, you already have a blender that's good, but just not powerful enough to make nut milk, or you can't afford a Vitamix at this time and you want to make nut milk at home. It's still good and it's still creamy, but I definitely think it is more expensive because you need more nuts to make creamy milk. And it's still not as creamy as the Vitamix because they're not being broken down as much in the blender. I still think that it's honestly great. Like I'm not saying I don't like the Almond Cow. I would still recommend it if you think that that's what is going to most serve you in your life right now. For me personally, if I had an extra $90 to buy a refurbished Vitamix, I would just buy that because not only can I make nut milk, but I can also make nut butters and soups and other things along those lines. But if you don't have that, I think the Almond Cow is a great option. I also want to say that any Vitamix model is powerful enough to make nut milk and they all work about the same way. So spending $700 versus $290, you're still going to get the same nut milk. They just get more expensive when you add extra functions and they're also a little bit quieter as they get more expensive as well. But yep, I think that's pretty much it. I hope you guys enjoy this video. If you want a more condensed format of this or something to come back to, again, I wrote a blog post with full pictures of the nut pulp and everything, all the things each of the devices come with. So it's in full detail. It's linked below if you want to check that out or share it with a friend. And if you like this more review style video, definitely let me know. I can feel more like it. Just leave a comment. And if you haven't subscribed to my channel yet and you like what you see here, feel free to do so. I'd be happy to have you. And yep, I'm going to go drink some almond milk, maybe make some hot chocolate or like a latte. That sounds really good. But I hope you guys have an awesome rest of your day, whatever time of day it is for you. And I look forward to seeing you in the next video. Bye.