Lactose intolerant people feel very sick wth abdominal pain, bloating, gas, diarrhea and nause after eating any food containing the milk sugar known as lactose. These people do not have enough lactase, an enzyme needed to break down lactose. Many lactose-free products are available, and they are almost identical in taste and texture to their lactose-containing counterparts. This is especially true of lactose-free milk.
Regular Milk
Lactose-free milk contains all but one ingredient found in regular milk. Regular milk contains water, fat, protein, minerals, vitamins, enzymes and a sugar called lactose. Cow milk is pasteurized and homogenized or blended together from different cows to standardize the fat content and prevent cream separation. The three most common milk varieties include whole milk ,which has 3.25 percent fat, partly skimmed milk, which has 1 to 2 percent fat and skim milk, which has 0.1 percent fat or less. Lactose-free milk contains all of these ingredients except lactose.
Vitamins
Lactose-free milk and regular milk products currently have added vitamin A and vitamin D to increase the nutritional value of the milk. Vitamin A is not a specific chemical. Rather, it is a group of chemical compounds involved in vision, bone growth, reproduction, cell division, immune functions and cellular differentiation, the process by which cells become specialized. There are two categories of vitamin A compounds: retinols from animal sources, such as fortified milk products and carotinoids from plant sources, such as colorful fruits and vegetables. Your body readily digests the retinols found in fortified milk, increasing milk's health benefits. Vitamin D increases your body's ability to absorb milk's calcium, building and increasing the strength of your teeth and bones.
Lactase
Although lactose is found in regular milk, this ingredient is absent in lactose-free milk. Lactose, or milk sugar, is a disaccharide made of two monosaccharide sugar molecules, glucose and galactose bonded together. Lactase is an enzyme that digests lactose, breaking the disaccharide down into its monomer glucose and galactose units. Glucose and galactose are perceived to be sweeter tasting than lactose, which explains why lactose-free milk tastes "sweeter" even though the "milk sugar" has been digested and removed. People who are not lactose-intolerant have sufficient levels of lactase to digest lactose themselves. Lactose-intolerant people either do not have sufficient lactase, or the enzyme is somehow defective. Adding lactase to milk to pre-digest the milk sugar does not change any other properties or nutritional value of the milk.
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