Silk Almondmilk Ingredients and Facts

Whether you're lactose intolerant, vegan or looking for an alternative to cow's milk, consider trying almond milk. Silk brand offers a number of different types of almond milk, including flavored, unflavored, unsweetened and light. Each type has its own nutritional profile, and some choices are smarter than others, but you can fit all of them into a balanced diet.

Silk Almondmilk offers two unsweetened choices, including original and vanilla flavored. Both contain almond milk, which is made from almonds and filtered water, sea salt, locust bean gum, sunflower lecithin, gellan gum and natural flavor. The difference is in the order of the ingredients, which indicates quantity. Silk Unsweetened Vanilla Almondmilk lists natural flavor as the third ingredient, while the original flavor lists it last.

Nutritionally, both unsweetened varieties are very similar. One cup of either milk contains 30 calories, 2.5 grams of fat, less than 1 gram of carbohydrate and 1 gram of protein. They're also good sources of calcium and vitamin D, meeting 45 percent of the daily value for calcium and 25 percent of the daily value for vitamin D, which is the same for all the different varieties of Silk Almondmilk.

Silk Almondmilk is also available in the sweetened original flavor, as well as vanilla and dark chocolate flavors. All three milks contain the same ingredients as the unsweetened Silk Almondmilk, with the addition of cane sugar. The dark chocolate flavor also contains cocoa.

There are some differences in nutrition between the three sweetened flavors of Silk Almondmilk. One cup of the original flavor contains 60 calories, 2.5 grams of fat, 8 grams of carbs and 1 gram of protein. The flavored milks are higher in calories and carbs, with 100 calories and 19 grams of carbs in the dark chocolate, and 90 calories and 16 grams of carbs in the vanilla. Both have the same amount of fat and protein as the original flavor.

Light varieties of the original and the vanilla flavors are available. Both contain the same ingredients as their regular counterparts, including the cane sugar.

According to the Silk website, both flavors contain 1/3 fewer calories than the original flavor. A 1-cup serving of the light original contains 40 calories, 2 grams of fat, 5 grams of carbs and less than 1 gram of protein. The same serving of the light vanilla contains 60 calories, 2 grams of fat, 11 grams of carbs and less than 1 gram of protein.

Almond milk is not as good a source of protein as cow's milk, but Silk includes a line of almond milk in the vanilla and the original flavor with added protein and fiber. The protein comes from pea protein, the fiber from corn dextrin.

One cup of the original with added protein and fiber contains 90 calories, 2.5 grams of fat, 10 grams of carbs, 5 grams of fiber and 5 grams of protein. The same serving of vanilla with added protein and fiber contains 100 calories, 2.5 grams of fat, 13 grams of carbs, 5 grams of fiber and 5 grams of protein.

Cow's milk does not contain fiber, but 1 cup of nonfat cow's milk contains 8 grams of protein.