Why does Japanese milk taste so different from American milk?

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I do not know were your other respondants got there answers from or what planet there arrived here from??

I am a former chef from Canada and have visited and worked in Japan, Japanese cows eat grass and not sushi, there milk is not sweetened with sugar, nor is it unpasturized, actually it is ultra-pasturized.

The issues you had were just a taste issue, I worked in Singapore and visited other Asian countries and there milk is not much different, and would taste a bit off if you were to travel there also. Most use a condensed milk, and they are not big milk drinkers, they do have a type of sweetened condensed milk similar to Eagle Brand sold in North America, they use it mostly for cooking or in iced coffee.

As mentioned by The Unknown Chef, Japanese milk is more pasteurized. However I find the biggest difference is the fat content. Back when I lived in Canada I usually drank 1% milk and sometimes 0.5% or 2% but in Japan I can only get 3.5% or fat free. Both of those taste pretty gross to me but I've found that if I buy one of each and mix them I get milk that tastes similar to Canadian milk.

Two other factors contribute to the different taste. The milk I buy in Japan is in cartons but in Canada it was always in jugs. Even in Canada I always thought carton-milk tasted weird. The last point is that Japanese supermarkets may not be as scrupulous about keeping milk refrigerated all the time or may have less cold refrigerators. I'm not sure whether this is true but to me it often tastes like milk that has been sitting out on a counter for half a day and then put back in the fridge.

One other thing, when I buy milk I always make sure what I'm buying says 牛乳 (milk) on it. There tends to be a lot of ones labelled 牛飲料 (milk beverage), which to me implies that it is not really milk so I don't buy those ones.