Questions about our products
If you can't find your answer here, please drop us a message.
Do you have an Amino Acid profile for your protein powders?
Yes, you can find it here.
Whats the difference between whey protein and whey protein isolate?
Read about the difference here
Where is the expiry date?
It's printed on the underside of the pouch. Because our powder products are low in fat, they will typically last for about 2 years.
How many tablespoons is one serving?
We recommend a 30g serve, which is approximately 2 tablespoons. There is a scoop in the bag but sometimes if gets buried in the powder, so you might have to take a fork and dig around for it!
Are the mono and di-glycerides vegetarian?
Yes, the mono and di-glycerides in our product are plant-derived.
Is our dairy protein tested for heavy metals?
Yes our dairy protein is tested for Heavy Metals via a national testing program NZ and also periodically tested in independent labs in NZ and in the US.
Below is further information on the NZ testing program:
New Zealand's raw milk supply is monitored through the National Chemical Contaminants Program (NCCP), operated by New Zealand's Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI). The program has been effective in confirming that dairy products are free of chemical residues at levels that could pose a threat to human health or to international trade. NCCP testing has shown that raw milk is very low in heavy metal contaminants and provide assurance that the entire NZ Dairy Industry being free of harmful levels of heavy metals.
Our dairy protein is periodically tested by IANZ accredited external laboratories for heavy metals and other elements of interest. Our products have shown to be very low in these contaminants. TAHA Health & Nutrition confirms that no heavy metals are added to products and any levels detected are naturally occurring in milk.
Link to general information about the program: here
Link to the elements tested under the NCCP and the limits allowable: here
Is our protein “undenatured”?
This is another question we get asked quite a lot….and the answer (again) is “it depends”.
Protein denaturation is the term used to describe a change in the form of a protein from its original ‘native’ state, to a new form. Imagine a ball of string unravelling. This can be caused by many things, including acid, agitation, and heat.
Milk protein is made up of 2 types of proteins– casein and whey. Casein is unstable and gels (i.e. denatures) when exposed to acid (like when you add lemon juice to milk, or when fermentation produces acid to make delicious, nutritious yogurt), however it is heat stable. In the case of whey proteins, they are sensitive to heat, and that is the main cause of whey protein denaturation. You may have seen this already when you heat a cup of milk and there is a skin left on the top as it cools – that is the whey protein denaturing with heat.
Our supplier makes a whole range of different whey proteins for different purposes. Some are not denatured (aka “native proteins”) and some are highly denatured. Each has different benefits depending on the application that they are being used in i.e. powdered drink mixes vs bars, and all are still highly nutritious.
Denaturation of protein impacts the solubility of the protein i.e. how it dissolves when added to liquid. Heavily denatured protein is often insoluble, meaning that if you mix it in water, it won’t dissolve. If a heavily denatured protein is used in an RTM shake, it wouldn’t be very nice to drink. That doesn’t mean that your body can’t digest it or use the nutrients and amino acids that it provides. It may change the speed at which your body digests it, but a lot of the time that remains the same too, which is the case for our proteins.
Many common proteins are denatured to provide a more enjoyable eating experience – think about cooking a steak, or frying an egg where the texture and the taste both change when you cook them. They both are still nutritious and the cooking process provides the key to unlocking the nutritional benefits of that protein by making it more desirable to eat. Controlled denaturation is a good thing in some applications as the highly denatured protein provides enhanced texture, a better flavor, or makes the product more digestible. For example, the protein that is typically used in bars is often highly denatured so that it retains the soft texture and structure of the bar over time, where a regular WPC goes much harder and is much chewier, making the bar less enjoyable to eat.
Is our protein "cold processed"?
It’s a question we get asked quite a lot….and the answer is “it depends”.
Other than rare sources of raw milk (e.g. raw milk cheese) that aren’t relevant to TAHA Health & Nutrition products, all commercially available milk and dairy products in the USA are heat treated for food safety reasons. This process is called pasteurization and is done to remove pathogenic (i.e. harmful) bacteria with a quick heat treatment of 161°F for 15 seconds. Food law also requires milk and dairy products to be pasteurized to be exported from New Zealand. Pasteurization is a heat step, but it has very little impact on milk proteins and all major milk proteins remain in their original/native state.
Our supplier of whey proteins has a variety of ingredients specially designed and processed for optimal nutrition and functionality in the finished products you receive. For ready to mix powders the processing is as gentle and cool as possible to ensure optimal solubility so you can enjoy a smooth shake. On the other hand, whey protein for nutrition bars makes for a more enjoyable eating experience with higher heat processing, hence in our bar proteins the processes are hotter, but the nutritional benefits remain the same.
The “Cold Processed” question seems to arise from a belief that heating denatures (or unravels) protein molecules, and that it may impact its nutritional goodness. Some extreme heat steps will lead to amino acid loss (and therefore nutrition loss), but these are not used in the dairy industry today and so are not applied to our ingredients.
For more about protein denaturation, see our comments in the next Q&A post…
Does heat impact the product?
We recommend that TAHA Health & Nutrition products are kept in a cool, dark place away from direct sunlight (i.e. your pantry!), and ideally are stored at temperatures not exceeding 25c/77F. However, we have not seen any issues where temperature has impacted the product quality to date.
Do we sell on Amazon?
Yes, please follow the link to our store if you prefer to buy off Amazon.
Is our WPI processed via Ion Exchange or Microfiltration?
TAHA WPI is manufactured using the ion exchange process that selectively isolates specific protein components, allowing other elements (carbohydrates, fats, and minerals) to be removed, resulting in a purer, higher protein finished product. Basically, the Ion Exchange process means that liquid whey is sent through a column that collects the proteins and separates them based on differences in their net charge. The rest of the molecules (lactose and minerals) are removed and further processed into different products. Ion exchange allows the selection and retention of all functional and nutritional proteins in whey, including bioactive proteins such as immunoglobulins and lactoferrin, meaning more of the “good” is kept inside the product. The product then goes through a cold process ultrafiltration step to concentrate the proteins and is then evaporated and dried to create the purest protein on the planet!
Are TAHA protein powders third-party tested?
All TAHA products are tested for food safety parameters (chemical, microbiological and physical) at the following locations:
- The ingredient manufacturer – dairy proteins, flavors, and other ingredients that are blended together to create the final product
- The co-manufacturer who blends the above ingredients and packages the protein powder under our TAHA brand
We also complete additional testing at:
- 3P Laboratories who run the nutritional analysis on certain batches of product to ensure that they meet the nutritional facts panel data
- 3P Laboratories who test for Glyphosate residue for The Detox Project.
Questions about animals being grass-fed
What does ‘Grass-fed’ mean?
There is no international standard that defines the term ‘Grass-fed’. For our suppliers, ‘Grass-fed’ means that our cows in New Zealand have access to pasture year-round and their diet consists predominately of grass and grass products such as grass silage, hay and forage crops (mainly legumes and brassica). For our suppliers cows in NZ, 96% is the current grass-fed percentage on a ‘as consumed’ basis. This data is reviewed annually and the average is measured over the previous three seasons data and subject to minor variation.
Does a Non Grass Diet really make a difference to a cow, or to me?
Yes, it does. Cows are ruminants which means that they are made to eat and digest grass and other pasture plants. When they are put onto a diet of grain or corn, they get sick more often which leads to unhealthy and unhappy animals and increased use of antibiotics. While those antibiotics don't end up in your food (all milk is tested and must be free of antibiotic residues), what it can cause is an increase in antibiotic resistant bacteria in animals, which has a knock on effect to other animals and therefore can impact our food chain and eventually, us.
Should animals go into barns in winter?
Yes, if it's too cold for them and it puts them in danger. But New Zealand is different from parts of the United States, where it gets very cold. New Zealand has a temperate to subtropical climate, so the cows can stay outdoors all year, roaming freely and eating as much grass as they please.
What makes up the remaining 4% of a cow’s ‘as consumed’ diet?
Because our suppliers farm the way that nature intended, they are subject to environmental conditions and there are times when grass growth is low e.g. if New Zealand experience a drought. During these times, pasture management practices and/or feeding of supplements may be used. Supplementary feeding ensures cows receive adequate nutrition and animal welfare requirements are met. Supplementary feeds mainly used on our supplier's New Zealand farms are maize silage, concentrates and palm kernel extract.
How do you know that our suppliers cows spend more time on pasture than anywhere else in the world?
To substantiate the Access to Pasture Claims our supplier has compared their dairying system in New Zealand to major dairying competitor countries. Our supplier identified the top 15 dairy exporting countries (including New Zealand), based on their annual dairy product export volumes in 2017. Of these top 15 dairy exporting countries, only Ireland operates a similar pasture-based model to New Zealand. Other countries with non-pasture grazed farming systems will not compete with New Zealand or Ireland in terms of time on pasture due to the amount of time spent in housed environments. Our supplier has data that supports that their dairy cows in New Zealand spend more time on pasture than dairy cows in Ireland. Based on Irish data presented in O’Brien et al. 2018, dairy cows in Ireland have access to pasture, on average, 255 days per year. In New Zealand, data from our supplier 2017-18 dairy season Farm Dairy Records show that our our suppliers New Zealand cows spend, on average, 97% of their non-milking time outside on pasture which is more than 350 days of a year.
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