三元鲜奶 SanYuan Fresh Milk

The low fat fresh milk from Carrefour last Saturday turned bad on Sunday. I felt my coffee tasted a little funny but it was Kristine's full cup that revealed the off taste. Called their QA hotline this morning. A young lady from SanYuan manufacturing came by at 2pm, took the 'mutated' milk away and left us with 2x2ltr cartons packed this morning. Excellent customer service, happy customers.

San Yuan is a Beijing brand, a brand that literally emerged untainted from the melamine poisioning scandals in 2008.

The young lady explained as the days get hotter (now in the high 20's), fresh milk quality tends to get compromised because most supermarket freezer shelves get warm too (around 10degC instead of below 5degC needed to store fresh milk). Coming to think about it, I once bought fresh milk of another brand at the same Carrfour. Production date was as fresh as it got (day after production, as it takes 1 day to reach the supermarket shelves), but the cartons were at room temperature. They must have been sitting in the receiving warehouse for a long while before being stacked onto freezer shelves. It was much cooler then.

On the subject of supermarket hygiene, supermarkets (Tesco, Carrefour, Walmart too) here allow naked hands to touch and select pieces of exposed meats (chicken parts including fillets, various cuts of beef and pork). You can buy those packed on trays over-wrapped in clear PVC sheets too but they cost roughly 50% to 100% more. I saw fruits and vegetables being packed that way, taking the fruits and vegies from the same trays that multiple hands have ruffled through. I am not sure if the packed meats were packed BEFORE the rest were put on open trays or they were picked from the same trays anyway.

No problem for me with fruits and vegetables from open trays but I have big emotional hangups with those meats from open trays in smkts. My usual meats come from butchers in the open markets, always early around 630am, when the meats were just delivered. I always get my cuts from bigger pieces stacked at the back of the chopping table where other customers cannot reach.

I have problem with meats that million fingers have squeezed through. Then again, I have been sleeping on hotel beds which...........