There are two kinds of milk you can get these days in India. One is the fresh milk in thin plastic pouches from your local milk company --- Nandini in Bangalore and Aarey etc in Mumbai, and the other is milk that has been put into tetrapaks. The first kind are sold fresh, and have to be consumed within 24 hours of purchase, come what may. The tetrapak variety has been processed so that the milk retains its quality for up to 6 months without refrigeration, if you dont open it. And even if you do open the pack, I have known it to be safe for at least 5 days. You also do not need to boil the tetrapak variety. It is so sterile, you can drink it sraight out of the pack! Infact, I got so used to this that once when I was transferred to Pune, I bought fresh milk and did not boil it -- and had it the next day -- without keeping it in the fridge -- and got a most horrible case of food poisoning... In the good old days when I was young, we used to drink fresh milk from packets. I remember them boiling it in a vessel. I never quite digged the taste. It was always slightly -- off. And the cream that collected on the top was a little yellowish. When tetrapak milk came out we tried it and never switched back.
Nestle is among our favorite brands. I have been drinking Nestle milk for 6-7 years now. However, there have been a couple of reasons why I am slowly switching back: I’m staying alone in Bangalore now. Nestle milk is the only variety of packaged milk available, and since it is shipped fronm out of the city, it costs 26 Rs. a litre. On the other hand, Nandini fresh milk is less than half the cost, at Rs. 12 a litre. The good news is that Nandini milk doesnt have yellow cream on the top (like I remember the Mumbai fresh milk having from my childhood). Another thing I noticed is that Nescafe Sunrise Extra -- the cheapest Nescafe blend, which I had earlier reviewed as being too bitter -- tastes very normal with Nandini milk! So cheaper milk and cheaper coffee go well together. Why should I complain :) I’ll stick with Nandini milk because its cheaper. However Nestle is really useful if you need to have some milk around but you stay alone and dont drink it much. You can keep a stash of tetrapacks in your kitchen, and keep the open one in your fridge. It will easily last a week.