The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1871-04-27
FARMERS COLUMN.
BUTTER MAKING-HOW TO DO IT.
To the Editors of the Janes0ille Gazette.
ST. Louis, April 10th, 1871.

persons interested in the dairy business
and dealers in such products, l am IN
duced to indite. some important facts TO
be observed, and things to be done to
make and keep butter. Your paper was
suggested as a valuable medium to bring
it under the eyes of both producers and
dealers in -FOUR locality, which is fast
becoming noted for the production of
butter and cheese. Almost every farmer
knows that there is difference In cows,
as to quality and quantity of butter; and
eyery breed has its advocate, but l deem
it the best way to test and prove each
cow. The greatest obstacles to the max
ing of good butter in the west, are pro-
per food and water for the COWS and
suitable conveniences for keeping milk,
cream. and butter. Clean pastures, free
from weeds, garlic, brush, low trees, DC,
are absolutely essential. Timothy, white
clover, blue grass and red-tops are all
very good; but / consider timothy the
best, and most natural in your locality, as
it makes solid butter, with delicate
flavor. Bluegrass is by many thought to-
be as good as timothy, and mixture of
grasses better than any one. Glover, es-
peciallv the common red clover, alone,
butter to keep. and no better, if as good,
in flavor. Next to the feed, great care
should be taken that the COWS have only
good pure water, either from pure run
ming streams, springs or wells. Stagnant
surface water such as many farms In the
west have, certainly is bad, and no dairy
man, whose cows drink such, can make
good butter When one reflects upon
e. 4Lo4 - cat or
drinks, some portion is secreted IN the
milk, they will at once see the Importance
of attention to food and water. Many
good dairymen have known, to nearly
ruin their butter during the drouth Of
summer by the streams becoming low
and stagnant, and not providing good
water for the COWS. Next in order, after
getting good cows, good food and good
water are proper places to keep milk,
cream and butter; and these are equally
essential to the preceding requirments
Every dairyman should study his own
situation, as to hOso he should keep them
at proper temperature and In sweet
calm place and pure atmosphere; with
out which even though his cows food and
water be good all his efforts will be
Valueless. 1t is generally thought that
milk should be kept at steady tempera
ture not over sixty nor much under fifty
FIVE degrees, and that cream and butter at
one considerably below. 1t is very i'm
portant that everything about the milk
room should be sweet and clean, well
ventilated with pure, fresh air, and no
foul air from stables, outbuildiDgs, etc,
near the milk room. Almost every dairy
man has some way in which he can &C
complish this with cold spring water,
room in cool shady part of his house,
or one partly below the surface OF the
ground, or in cool, dry, well ventilated
cellar, and proper ventilation and clean
illness. Certain it is, that such a tenn
perature, or near it, at all times of the
year, must be attained and everything
about the milk kept sweet and clean,
in order 70 make good butter. Placing
the vessel in cold running water in hot
weather, in such o manner as not TO have
too mnch dampness in the room, and the
stream so regulated as to keep the milk
at the right temperature is = way often
adopted by butter factories. Some Set
the vessels in vats of water tempered with
ice. Any one who has but slight
knowledge of sunlight and shade, the
temperature of the ground, water and ice,
and some ideas of ventilation, can bring
some of these appliances into service, ana
if he does not do it, he should censure no
one but himself, if he has nothing but
grease, and gets only the price of it.
The same ideas must be carried out to
keep both cream and butter. When one
has deep cool well, the cream is often
put into tin can, or some vessel, and
suspended in the we'll, and perhaps the
bottom in the water, and kept there ur-
til taken out to be chulned. Gaze
should be taken to skim the milk bcfo e
it sours. A neglect to do this will make
poor butter and less of it. The milk pans
or pals, In which the milk is set, must be
thoroughly cleansed and scalded and
then heated in the sun, or by a stove or
fire. If this is not done, an acid will
gather on them that will make bitter
butter. Churning every day, especially
In hot weather, should be pIactlced.
Every good dairyman knows that the
cream should be kept cool during the
process of churning, at about sixty-two
degrees, and that sweet and sour cream
should not be churned together. In sepa.
rating butter from the butter milk, wash
ing the butter-milk out with clear, cold
we'll water, or with ice water, is very nee
cessary in order to get it all out, without
too much working, and to keep the but
ter hard. The water should be worked
out and the butter made as firm as posi-
BIZ, Too much working Injuries butter,
making it salvy, and destroying that
grain, like sugar, which good butter has.
Much has been said and written in favor
of, and against, washing out the butter
milk with water, but believe it is well
settled by good dairymen that with water