Streaky Butter

New Zealand Listener, Volume 30, Issue 759, 5 February 1954, Page 23

Streaky Butter

Year Aunt Daisy, A young friend of mine, who has married a farmer, and gone to make a home on a small piace in the country, has written to me for advice about her but-ter-making; and I thought perhaps there might *be other girls in the country, also "new to the game" as she is, who are having the same difficulty. So perhaps a féw hints on this subject may not come amiss. My husband who has handled cream by the hundreds of _ gallons weekly, taught me how to make bitter, and I used to be very proud of the demand there was for it, though I don’t make it now. My young friend's chief trouble was getting her butter "streaky," and I have told her how to prevent that. If you put the salt in the chutn with the cream, you will never have a streak in the butter, and it will be evenly salted and delicious. In fact, it is really best to add the salt to the cream each day, when you put it in the stone jar, of whatever you keep it in. The correct proportion is one heaped dessertspoon ordinary cooking salt to every 2 pints cream. Stir well each time you put in fresh cream. In this way the salt is well and evenly mixed. The temperature of the cream when about to be churned is very important, too. It must not be too warm, or too cold. The proper temperature is 62 degrees, though it is all right if it is as low as 58 degrees. After churning tun off the buttermilk and then wash the butter three times in the churn, with clean water of the same température as the cteam. Do not add more salt and be sure to "work" the butter very well, getting every bit of moisture out. The buttermilk, of course, will not be of any use for either drinking or cooking, as it will be too briny.