[naniwaduni]

They're not even remotely substitutable. Different plant milks aren't even culinarily substitutable for each other. It's like substituting vinegar for cooking wine: broadly speaking, it'll usually work, but they're really not the same thing.

"milk" is more of a visual descriptor than a culinary classification.

[Retric]

People substituting almond milk for cow milk in cereal is it’s number one use. That’s cooking by the preparing food for consumption definition, even if you don’t use heat that’s hardly required.

[rootw0rm]

I don't know what kind of cooking you do, but in my kitchen substituting vinegar for wine would be considered food-crime.

[naniwaduni]

Oh, absolutely; I'm saying it's not any better to substitute, say, almond milk for cow milk. Worse, even; substituting vinegar for wine won't usually make the whole recipe fall apart altogether the way not enough fat will.

[faemir]

Hyperbole much? If they weren't remotely substitutable then why do coffee shops freely offer them as a... substitute. And interchangeably between different plant-based ones at that.

[jfim]

They probably don't work interchangeably in scenarios where the physical characteristics of the milk is a linchpin of the recipe. Baking in general requires precise temperature control and ingredient control (eg. cake, pastry, and bread flour types), whereas adding milk is more of a flavoring that doesn't impact the resulting drink at much (your coffee won't be a chewy inedible mess if you put a different kind of milk).