If butter is ladled, all the implements used should be scalded at least once a day, and kept in fresh-made brine.
When butter becomes rancid, it is due to the formation of Butyric acid. A fair measure of freshness can be obtained by thoroughly washing it with fresh milk, which readily absorbs Butyric acid, and then with fresh water to remove the milk, so that it will not sour in the butter.
All this care on the part of the retailer is, however, often upset by the customer's lack of care after purchasing. Whenever possible, customers should be advised to keep butter free from contaminating influences. Very few households can enjoy separate refrigerator compartments for butter, but every one can have a covered china or earthenware vessel in which to keep it—then, if the refrigerator is kept scoured and dry and the vessel clean, scalded before use, and always covered, there is a reasonable chance of the butter retaining its purity unless the other articles in the refrigerator have very strong odors.
If a customer has no jar, the best advice is to keep the butter always thoroughly wrapped in the waxed paper in which you deliver it.
A good refrigerator and a plentiful supply of ice are, of course, desirable for keeping butter, but care along the lines mentioned is to so great an extent the essential point, that butter will stay fresh and pure for a reasonable time without either refrig erator or ice if kept in a dry, clean, covered vessel set in a cool place—the butter under such circumstances being preferably kept wrapped in waxed paper inside the vessel. A damp or "musty" room—or its vicinity—should be carefully avoided as that odor has as close an affinity for butter as any other.
Where such advice can be given without offense, it is well worth while imparting it, with a view to avoiding the trouble so frequently caused by customers, generally in perfectly good faith, bringing butter back as "bad" which had left the store in good condition.
The natural color of the best creamery butter throughout the greater part of the year varies from almost white to a delicate light yellow or cream—it is only in the spring when the cows are first turned out to pasture that it naturally presents a really yellow color. The average consumer, however, expects butter to have a good bright color all the year round—and in consequence nearly all butter is brought up to that appearance by the use of various coloring additions. The colors used are chiefly those derived from vegetable sources, as annatto and carrot juice.
In contrast to the general taste, there has developed in the larger cities a con siderable demand among the customers of high class stores for uncolored and unsalted butter—variously known as "Fresh," "Sweet" and "French." Some of the French stores of the metropolis and elsewhere have always handled this for their patrons, but the present sale to a large number of families of other nationalities and to many high class hotels and restaurants is of comparatively recent origin.
The perfumed butter used in Paris is made by taking pats of "fresh" or unsalted butter and placing them on a layer of some variety of flowers, according to the per fume desired, a piece of muslin being laid between the butter and blossoms. Another layer of flowers is placed above the butter and then ice is added.