The washing of the butter after churning is an important part of the process ; carelessness means the failure to remove enough of the buttermilk, which gives a streaked butter of poor keeping qualities. Butter made on the farm often fails to be good because of insufficient working. Salting not only gives flavor, but helps in the keeping of the butter, partly by aiding the removal of the buttermilk. The amount of moisture in butter varies, but more than sixteen per cent is usually illegal ; the aver- age amount is about twelve per cent. Butter which is kept too long becomes rancid, that is, of poor flavor and odor. This rancidity may be from two causes, the more common of which is not the decomposition of the fat, but the spoiling of the protein present in the curd. Renovated or process butter is butter which has BUTTER 265 been reworked after becoming more or less rancid. The butter fat is removed from the rest by melting, and air is blown through to remove any bad odor ; then it is mixed with fresh cream or milk, and churned. Some states restrict the sale of this butter, although they permit the sale of poor butter. Many housewives seem to be ignorant of the fact that poor tasting butter can be renovated fairly well at home by merely working the butter, so as to wash it thoroughly, in a succession of bowls of cold water. Oleomargarine or butterine has one advantage over butter, although it lacks the fine flavor. It is cheaper. It is made by churning other-than-butter fats with milk, or milk and butter, or milk and cream. Soft beef fat and neutral lard are often used and are sometimes mixed with cottonseed oil, cocoanut fat, or peanut oil. The butter makers have succeeded in having a tax of ten cents a pound placed on colored butterine, which makes the price of the product too high for it to compete with butter. The tax on uncolored oleomargarine is only a quarter of a cent a pound. As many people object to "colorless butter", fats which have a natural yellow color are used to give a colored product and yet avoid the excessive tax. Unfortunately the butterine made with the yellow fats does not seem to keep as well as the other. Oleomargarine is a perfectly clean, wholesome food and should be more widely used than it is. Many people cannot distinguish the difference in flavor between it and butter, especially for any use except with bread, and the flavor is decidedly to be preferred to that of poor butter. Its use in Europe is much more extensive than in this country. Buttermilk may contain not more than 0.2 per cent of fat, whereas normal milk contains about four per cent. 266 FOOD STUDY This makes it evident that buttermilk is less hearty than whole milk, although there is a common belief that the contrary is true. Such milk is valued not only for its flavor and perhaps for its increased digestibility, but also for the lactic acid bacteria present. Some authorities hold that these bacteria are carried into the small intestine and keep in check the growth of those bacteria which cause putrefaction. Much of the milk sold as buttermilk is really fermented skim milk containing perhaps only 0.1 per cent of fat. The greater digestibility of fermented milk seems to lie in the finely divided condition of the protein. REFERENCES U. S. Dept. of Agriculture. Farmers' Bulletin No. 384. " Whipped

AI-modernized reading of the original text

The washing of the butter after churning is an important part of the process ; carelessness means the failure to remove enough of the buttermilk, which gives a streaked butter of poor keeping qualities. Butter made on the farm often fails to be good because of insufficient working. Salting not only gives flavor, but helps in the keeping of the butter, partly by aiding the removal of the buttermilk. The amount of moisture in butter varies, but more than sixteen per cent is usually illegal ; the average amount is about twelve per cent. Butter which is kept too long becomes rancid, that is, of poor flavor and odor. This rancidity may be from two causes, the more common of which is not the decomposition of the fat, but the spoiling of the protein present in the curd. Renovated or process butter is butter which has BUTTER 265 been reworked after becoming more or less rancid. The butter fat is removed from the rest by melting, and air is blown through to remove any bad odor ; then it is mixed with fresh cream or milk, and churned. Some states restrict the sale of this butter, although they permit the sale of poor butter. Many housewives seem to be ignorant of the fact that poor tasting butter can be renovated fairly well at home by merely working the butter, so as to wash it thoroughly, in a succession of bowls of cold water. Oleomargarine or butterine has one advantage over butter, although it lacks the fine flavor. It is cheaper. It is made by churning other-than-butter fats with milk, or milk and butter, or milk and cream. Soft beef fat and neutral lard are often used and are sometimes mixed with cottonseed oil, cocoanut fat, or peanut oil. The butter makers have succeeded in having a tax of ten cents a pound placed on colored butterine, which makes the price of the product too high for it to compete with butter. The tax on uncolored oleomargarine is only a quarter of a cent a pound. As many people object to "colorless butter", fats which have a natural yellow color are used to give a colored product and yet avoid the excessive tax. Unfortunately the butterine made with the yellow fats does not seem to keep as well as the other. Oleomargarine is a perfectly clean, wholesome food and should be more widely used than it is. Many people cannot distinguish the difference in flavor between it and butter, especially for any use except with bread, and the flavor is decidedly to be preferred to that of poor butter. Its use in Europe is much more extensive than in this country. Buttermilk may contain not more than 0.2 per cent of fat, whereas normal milk contains about four per cent. This makes it evident that buttermilk is less hearty than whole milk, although there is a common belief that the contrary is true. Such milk is valued not only for its flavor and perhaps for its increased digestibility, but also for the lactic acid bacteria present. Some authorities hold that these bacteria are carried into the small intestine and keep in check the growth of those bacteria which cause putrefaction. Much of the milk sold as buttermilk is really fermented skim milk containing perhaps only 0.1 per cent of fat. The greater digestibility of fermented milk seems to lie in the finely divided condition of the protein. U. S. Dept. of Agriculture. Farmers' Bulletin No. 384. " Whipped

Food study