ANALYSING MILK.

Waikato Times, Volume XL, Issue 3257, 13 May 1893, Page 2 (Supplement)

ANALYSING MILK.

'• A contemporary says:—The chemical analysis of milk is neither complicated nor difficult. A small dish is accurately weighed and the weight noted. Into it is now introduced a small portion of milk, and both are again weighed. By suotracting the weight of the dish from the/weight of both the weight of the milk is found and' carefully recorded. The milk is placed over a steam jet, and the water of the milk evaporates, leaving a residue. It is this residue which passes under the name of "solids." A last weighing of the dish with the milk resitluo, less the weight of the dish, gives the weight of the solids, aud by a simple calculation the percentage is found. The solids of milk have been found by innumerable aualyses to average about 13 per cent., and while the fat varies in the milk from different cows the solids left after extracting the fat are a very constant quality, hardly ever falling below 9 per cent. This gives the chemist a positive .basis for his calculations, and enables him to state with great, certainty whether or not the milk has been watered. The fat, or oil, in milk is determined by dissolving it by means of ether out of total solids, the residue remaining after the operation being termed "solids, not fat." The average fat or oil found in cows' milk is 3 per cent., and any amount less than this is generally taken as showing that the millt has been skimmed. If analysis shows a decrease of fat, aud solids not fat, it is said to fce certain that the milk has been watered, and if the fat only i 3 low that tho milk has been skimmed.