Almond Milk - Product Comparison

I’ve spoken to a couple of people recently who use almond milk as their go-to milk, and it got me thinking—some people might find this product review useful!

First things first: nutrition is all about nuance, and it’s hard to communicate nuance via a static blog post. For that reason, I didn’t want to start ranking every brand or nutrient from best to worst.

That said, I did select one brand that outperforms the others—and it’s probably not the one you think…

Secondly, you might have your preferred brand for reasons that exist outside of its nutrient profile, and that’s okay! You might genuinely think one brand conquers all others when it comes to flavour, and that’s also fine.

Comparison

Key Takeaways

Calcium: It’s wise to opt for a product fortified with calcium. Most have about 300 mg, which is roughly the same as a glass of cow’s milk. While there are loads of other food sources of calcium, if you’re limiting your dairy intake, it’s something to be conscious of. This is one of the red flags of products with no ingredients except almonds and water.

Almond Percentage: The lowest almond percentage of any product was 2.5%. Most people are probably using almond milk as a dairy replacement and want it to add some texture to their cereal or coffee—not necessarily because they’re trying to eat more almonds. Still, it’s worth pointing out that some of these products are essentially expensive water.

Sugar/Fat Content: For the most part, the quantities in these products aren’t high enough to matter. No need to spend hours staring at the fat or sugar content in the supermarket (I’ve been there), as chances are this almond milk makes up less than 5% of your total energy intake. It’s great to make small wins, but you can save yourself some time and stress on this one.

“Nothing But Almonds and Water” Products: Again, these products are basically water. None of the products reviewed had anything sinister in the ingredient list. Generally, the ingredients include fortified calcium (great) and sometimes other vitamins and minerals (also great). Most of the products did include an additive in some capacity (gum, antioxidant etc) but they are absolutely nothing to worry about. As a rule of thumb, we do want to limit our processed food intake, but there are bigger fish to fry than a glass of almond milk. Unless you need to avoid a particular ingredient for specific reasons, I’d opt for a version that’s calcium-fortified at a minimum.

Now, this brings me to the winning product…

It’s obvious that I’ve picked this on the basis of its protein content alone. I can’t think of too many non-medical reasons someone should be trying to reduce their protein intake, and as a general rule of thumb, most people could benefit from consuming more. This product contains soy protein as its protein source. If you’re going to drink almond milk, I think it makes sense to opt for a version that’s got some added protein!