A New Method to Distinguish the Milk Adulteration with Neutralizers by Detection of Lactic Acid

A liquid chromatographic method based on determining of the amount of lactic acid was developed to detect milk adulteration with neutralizers. The developed method can be applied to milk with pH values within the regular range of 6.5–6.7 that is suspected of being neutralised. Determination of lactic acid was carried out in milk acidified with lactic acid and neutralised with sodium hydroxide to simulate the adulteration. The validation parameters showed high linearity (R2 > 0.99), good precision (relative standard deviation ≤ 0.123%) and high sensibility (limit of detection 0.1 mg/L and limit of quantification 1 mg/L). The proposed method was applied to bacterially acidified and subsequently neutralised milk and detected a content of lactic acid of approximately 40 mg/100 mL in milk slightly acidified to pH 6.4. The developed method is simple, fast, precise and suitable for detecting the addition of hydroxides in sour milk. In parallel, the sodium content was determined in the same sodium hydroxide neutralised samples, but the addition of a small amount of this alkali does not affect the natural variation of sodium in milk.