When one of the world’s most elite footballers posts a YouTube video collecting raw milk straight from the farm, people notice. But behind the clickbait headlines and shock lies something simple, Haaland is doing what humans have done for centuries.
Here’s why it makes sense...
1. It contains lactase
Interestingly, many people who are “lactose intolerant” find they can drink raw milk without any issue. The reason?
It still contains the very enzyme needed to digest it. Pasteurisation destroys this lactase, leaving the body to do the work alone (and often struggling), which then leads to the bloating, gas, and discomfort often labelled as lactose intolerance.
Raw milk, on the other hand, still contains the enzymes and live bacteria that assist with lactose digestion. In other words, the problem isn’t the lactose itself, but the fact that we’ve stripped milk of the biological tools that make it digestible.
2. It’s nature’s original probiotic
Long before probiotic capsules lined health store shelves, humans were getting their gut support straight from the source, raw milk.
Raw milk naturally contains a diverse ecosystem of beneficial bacteria, including species like Lactobacillus, Leuconostoc, and Bifidobacterium. These are the same microbial strains now isolated and freeze-dried into commercial probiotic supplements, but in raw milk, they exist as part of a complete, living system.
These microbes don’t just “sit” in milk, they actively interact with it. They consume lactose, produce lactic acid, and secrete antimicrobial compounds that inhibit harmful bacteria. This self-protective ecosystem is one reason properly sourced raw milk, from healthy, grass-fed cows and clean milking conditions, tends to stay fresh longer than expected, often naturally fermenting into kefir rather than spoiling.
When this bacterial diversity enters the human gut, it helps seed and support the microbiome, the vast microbial network that influences digestion, immunity, and even mental health. Modern research shows that these bacterial species can improve the gut barrier, modulate inflammation, and enhance nutrient absorption, all vital for recovery and performance.
3. It supports healthy testosterone
For an athlete like Erling Haaland, hormones are the invisible architecture of performance. They dictate energy, muscle growth, recovery, mood, and resilience, and raw milk supports that entire network.
Raw milk is rich in the very building blocks of hormonal health… saturated fats, cholesterol, and fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, E, and K2). These are the raw materials your body uses to synthesise hormones like testosterone, progesterone, and cortisol, the key regulators of strength, stress response, and recovery.
For Haaland, this means supporting healthy testosterone production, essential for muscle repair, bone density, drive, and endurance, without relying on artificial supplementation.
The cholesterol and saturated fats in raw milk act as hormonal precursors, while its vitamin A and iodine content nourish the thyroid, the metabolic command centre that governs energy output and cellular repair. Vitamin K2, found abundantly in the butterfat of milk, ensures that calcium is directed to bones and teeth, not arteries, a subtle but crucial piece of long-term vitality for any athlete
4. It strengthens immunity
A constant flu is not a useful ally for an athlete. When your body is your career, every sore throat, sniffle, or inflammatory flare-up steals energy that should be going toward recovery and growth. And yet, in a world of ultra-processed convenience foods, immune resilience has become the exception, not the norm.
Raw milk offers an ancient solution to a modern vulnerability. It’s packed with immunoglobulins, lactoferrin, lysozyme, and cytokines, the bioactive compounds that form the body’s first line of defence. Lactoferrin, for instance, binds to iron, depriving harmful bacteria of the fuel they need to grow, while immunoglobulins (IgA, IgG, IgM) patrol the gut lining, neutralising pathogens before they enter the bloodstream. Lysozyme acts like a natural antibiotic enzyme, breaking down bacterial cell walls without harming beneficial microbes.
And that’s the beauty of raw milk, it doesn’t just “boost” the immune system, it regulates it. It creates a state of resilience rather than overreaction. For an athlete like Haaland, that means fewer infections, faster healing, and less chronic inflammation, the hidden saboteur of endurance and performance.
5. It’s the ultimate ancestral recovery drink
Before laboratories invented sports nutrition, there were farmers, herders, and warriors who knew this intuitively. After long days of labour, they drank milk in the evening, when cows were milked at dusk, and the body was already shifting toward rest. The tryptophan and calcium in raw milk work synergistically to support melatonin production, guiding the body into deeper sleep and more complete tissue repair.
Even the natural sugars in raw milk serve a purpose… they help replenish liver glycogen, allowing the body to balance stress hormones overnight.
For an athlete like Haaland, this translates to more than just stronger muscles, it means recovery that syncs with the body’s natural rhythms. The kind of regeneration you can’t measure on a smartwatch, but that you can feel…calmer nights, steadier mornings, and a body that knows how to rebuild itself.
