BUTTER is the fat or oleaginous parts of the milk of various animals, principally of the domestic cow. The milk of the cow consists of curd, whey, and butter, and is esteemed chiefly in proportion to the amount of butter, which differs much in that of different breeds.
For the making of butter, the milk, brought into the dairy from the milking - shed, is strained through a fine sieve or cloth into shal low pans, or troughs lined with lead, which are filled to the depth of four or five inches. These should be in a place sheltered from the sun, but having a thorough draught of air by means of opposite wire windows. The floor should be kept moist in summer, to produce coolness by evaporation ; but in winter a small stove is an advantage, provided smoke and smell be avoided. After standing twelve hours the finest parts of the cream will be found to have risen to the surface ; and this, if skimmed off, will furnish a very delicate butter. More generally however the milk is allowed to stand twenty-four hours, and then the cream is col lected, either by skimming or by letting off the thin milk from beneath it by opening plugs in the troughs. The cream is put in a deep earthen or stone-ware jar, which should be glazed, but not with lead ; and more is added every clay until there is sufficient to churn. The cream is usually stirred from time to time, to promote a slight acidity, which facili tates the process of churning.
There are many varieties of churn [CHURN] ; hut most of them have a beater or fan which agitates the cream. The barrel of the churn should not be more than two-thirds full of cream. In the course of an hour's agitation or churning, small kernels of butter are found among the cream, and these become gradually united into a solid mass, leaving a fluid resi due called butter-milk, which is set aside for domestic use, or for feeding pigs. The butter is then removed to a shallow tub, well beaten with the hand or a flat wooden spoon, and repeatedly washed with clear spring water, until all the remaining butter-milk is removed from it; after which, if intended to be sold fresh, it is made up in rolls or cakes for the market, or salted and put into casks if intended for keeping. Cakes or pats of fresh butter
are often impressed with some device from a carved wooden print, resembling a large seal. In Cambridgeshire butter is made up into rolls a yard long, and passed through. a ring of a certain diameter, for the convenience of divid ing it into small portions without weighing. In salting butter the quality of the salt is of great importance ; and some, instead of sim ple salt, use half an ounce of dry salt, pounded fine, two drams of sugar, and two drams of saltpetre, to every pound of butter. As a cask is gradually filled up, every addition is care fully incorporated with the preceding portion. Should it shrink in the cask, melted better may be poured round it to fill up the inter stices.
Butter may be preserved for domestic use, without salt, by melting it very gently, without boiling ; which causes the watery particles to evaporate, and the curd, which is always pre sent in small quantity and is a principal cause of rancidity, to fall to the bottom. The clear butter is then poured into an earthen vessel, and covered with paper ; and a piece of blad der or leather is tied over it to exclude the air. Butter thus prepared resembles lard in appearance, loses some of its flavour, but is much superior to salt butter for ordinary pur poses.
In Devonshire, instead of the ordinary mode of raising cream in shallow pans, the milk is, after standing twelve hours, exposed to heat, without boiling, by which a thick scum called clotted cream, more solid than cream, but not so solid as butter, is thrown up. A very slight agitation converts it into butter, another mode, which is followed in parts of Holland, Scotland, and Ireland, is to churn the milk and cream together, by which, it is said, more butter is produced.