MAKING OF BUTTER FROM SWEET CREAM.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1716, 18 January 1905, Page 61

MAKING OF BUTTER FROM SWEET CREAM.

(J. D. Leclair, Bulletin of the St. Hyacinthe (Quebec) Dairy School.)

This bulletin contains a detailed account of the methods that have been used in manufacturing butter in St. Hyacinthe School during the last three' years. Mr Leclair introduces the subject with an account of pasteurhation and starter preparations as followed at the school. He claims that- the mlk should not be heated above loodeg. for butter making, or cream above 140 deg. for 120 mmutes. It is absolutely necessary, he says, that after pasteurisation (when making butter by this method) the cream shall bo immediately cooled to 50 or even to 40deg. Ho treats the subject of ferments as follows: — Wliat we shall call cultivated ferments are the germs that are suited to' the production of the required aroma, and are propagated expressly for that purpose. In ordinary practice there are three sorts of these ferments according to this method employed in their preparation :

I.—The pure culture or trade ferments, so-called because, in addition to tho care taken in the selection of tho first seed, they are cultivated and propagated in sterilised media. Sterilisation being conducted only in closed vessels, under pressure, require- special care and apparatus: and this preparation has been carried on • by ehem.su

who put these products on the markets under their personal guarantee. The greater the care, the better the culture.

2.—Ferments prepared from new milk: It is a matter of importance that a judicious selection be made, and, as far as possible, the following conditiooe "s should be combined: A cow that givey very well flavoured m lk should bo taken—one that has recently calved and whose health is perfect. Before and after milkmg great cleanliness must he observed: the milk should be received in a vessel that has been well washed and steamed, and the air of the nlace must be perfectly mire. If a disinfectant or powerful germicide can be had • —formaline, for instance-—it would be worth while to sprinkle the clothes of the milker with it. and to reject the first jets from tho cow’s teats. The maker now .sets the milk at once in a pan of iced water, or, if no- ice, in the coldest water he can get, having previously cove. cci tho milk with a clean linen cloth; 12 hours afterwards he skims the milk and leaves it to- sour and curdle in a temperature of 70deg. Fall., keeping it well covered. The curd will be pretty firm when it leaves the sides of the vessel. end there itis—a mother-ferment, which you may us a as you wouM A PURE OR TRADE CULTURE. 3.—Ferments made from good skim milk at 175 deg. Fall, for 20 minutes, cool it quickly down to 70deg. and keep it so until it curdles like the former one. There will b*o your “mother-fer-ment,” to he used ns above. These three kinds of ferments are propagated in tho following imum r: The medium used as always good skim milk, pasteurised at 175d0g. Fall, for 20 minutes and ran idly cooled down to 70d*e<:. for tho first time, and to' 60d g. for all subsequent pronaga 4 ions, s:o long as no recourse i.s had to a fresh, “mother-ferment.” From 51b to 71b of ferment to a hundred pounds of pasteurised milk, will always g ve a good curd in 20 hours, if the temperature has been kept unifi im. If t on do not need tho ferment .so -con as. it is made, keep it, well covered, in the coolest place you have at a temperature h- low 40dtg. F. to stop fermentation. In every instance, you must not forget to tako off the top of the curd to about* an inch in denth before using it, whet lev for propagating or for putting into cream. It should ho very finely divided, so u.s to insure its thorough u!is Iwith the slum milk or the c; .U tho vo-so is and nten.s Is ;'i : !; ■■■(. I, . P u-ed in the preparation

of these ferments, must be invariably steamed, so as to be sterilised. The pure or trade culture ferment is preferable to the other kinds; the difficulty of finding proper or suitable milk, and of getting a good first fermentation, will always cause a want of uniformity in the flavour of the ‘‘mother ferment,” and consequently in the products. The cost of such is light, and by their propagation and proper care there will be no need to resort to the pure culture more than once a month. This rule is not without exceptions, for as soon as the flavour is not to your taste, the preparation you have been using must be rejected, and a fresh start be made. Mr Beclair distinguishes between the requirements for making BUTTER IN SUMMER AND WINTER and seems to regard the method of adding the ferment directly to the comparatively sweet cream in the chum as especially desirable for winter but-ter-making, although he says it has been adopted at the school during the summer season also with most satisfactory results.

Immediately after separation, the cream is pasteurised as before mentioned, the rapid changes of temperature causing a great evaporation of undesirable odours that may have been present, leaving the cream in an almost neutral condition and susceptible to any flavours or odours that may afterwards be presented. The pasteurised cream is kept at 50deg. Fah. for 3 hours, when it is ready for the chum; but if cooled to 40deg it may he churned as soon as it reaches that point. A 1 certain quantity of the ferment is added, which is strongly charged with lactic acid which would have been developed by the spontaneous fermentation of the cream. We know that this acid is needed to secure that the butter should possess that special flavour which our customers cannot do without. This ferment is added in a certain proportion as mentioned below. For this proportion we have first of all established a type or standard of acidity for cream, and one for the ferment, as well as a standard proportion of the ferment the best fitted, under these conditions, to attain the best results. And in all our daily work we vary this proportion, or percentage of ferment, according as we find that the acidity of the cream and the ferment of the day varies from these types. In this way, we preserve the same proportion of lactic acid with the fat, and we find a great uniformity of flavour in our butter one day with the other. The butter-milk, besides, when tested by the acidimeter, shows the presence of a quantity of acid obviously the same, the variation not being more than 0.05 of 1 per cent. A WOODEN STIRRER. minutely divides the ferment, and when pouring it into the chum, it is strained through a cheese cloth, that it may be thoroughly mixed with the serum, and that not a trace of it may be found in the butter. The churning should occupy about 50 minutes, and the rest of the work is carried out as in the odinary process in the summer. By spontaneous fermentation, even when aided by the use of a pretty large percentage of ferment—say, 5 or even 10 per cent. —we have never succeeded in getting the same richness and uniformity of flavour that this process of non-acetified cream always gives us. The acidity of the butter-milk will be seen to have varied but very little, which leads to the conviction that the flavour of the butter must be undoubtedly uniform, always presuming that the flavour of the ferments is also uniform. Mr Leclair considers certain objections that have been advanced against the method. First, as to the amount of ice required, there is really some saving, he says, as compared with other methods which involve pasteurisation. As to the need of facilities for_ rnpid cooling and control of temperature the requirement is admitted, but it is claimed that such facilities are necessary for best results by any method, and that special apparatus now on the market makes it easy to secure such means of cooling. As for the superiority of the product, he points to honours won at Sherbrook, Toronto and Ottawa last September, when four first prizes and one second prize were won with four scores of 97 and one of 96 points.

Variations in the process as used at the school in summer are the omission of pasteurisation and the eduction of the percentage of ferment, hut Mr Beclair seems to think it would be better to pasteurise the cream in summer also; it seems to have been omitted temporarily owing to the difficulty in introducing the system in the factories when pasteurisation in summer is insisted upon. As for the exhaustiveness of churning, economy in loss of fat is not especially claimed, but economical results may, it is said, be secured by proper management, just as in the churning of ripened cream.

Mr Led air does not claim that the product made by his method is superior to the finest ripened cream butter, but that it, nevertheless, offers many advantages in certainty of result© and unifomity of the butter. He makes comparisons of the processes, and presents a table giving figures of the butter manufactured at the School from 1902, to April, 1903, with other interesting particulars.