1622. To Preserve Butter by Salting

1622.    To Preserve Butter by Salting. Take fresh butter, 16 pounds; salt, 1 pound. Or: Fresh butter, 18 pounds; salt, 1 pound; saltpetre, 11/4 ounces; honey or fine brown sugar, 2 ounces. Proceed as in the last receipt.

1623. To Preserve Butter from the Air

1623.    To Preserve Butter from the Air. The best method to preserve butter from the air, is to fill the pots to within an inch of the top, and to lay on it common coarse-grained salt, to the depth of 1/2 or 3/4 inch, and then to cover the pot up with any flat article that may be convenient. The salt, by long keeping, will run to brine, and form a layer on the top of the butter, which will effectually keep out the air, and may at any time be very easily removed by turning the pot on one side.

1624. To Preserve Butter Sweet

1624.      To Preserve Butter Sweet. To every 20 pounds of butter take 3 pounds salt, 1 pound loaf sugar, 1/4 pound pulverized saltpetre; mix, and put a layer of butter about 8 inches thick, then sprinkle on a light covering of the above preparation alternately, until your cask is full. Pack in air-tight casks. Butter packed in this way will keep sweet for 2 or 3 years.

1625. To Restore Rancid Butter

1625.     To Restore Rancid Butter. Rancid butter may be restored by melting it in a water-bath with some fresh-burnt and coarsely powdered animal charcoal (which has been thoroughly freed from dust by sifting) and straining it through clean flannel. A better and less troublesome method is to well wash the butter, first with good new milk, and next with cold spring water. Butyric acid, on the presence of which rancidity depends, is freely soluble in fresh milk.

1626. To Improve Strong Butter

1626.     To Improve Strong Butter. This operation is extremely simple and practicable ; it consists in beating the butter in a sufficient quantity of water, in which put 25 to 30 drops chloride of lime to 2 pounds of butter. After having mixed it till all its parts are in contact with the water, it may be left in it for 1 or 2 hours, afterwards withdrawn, and washed in fresh water. The chloride of lime, having nothing injurious in it, can with safety be augmented; but it will generally be found that 12 to 14 drops to a pound of butter are sufficient. Butter, the taste and odor of which were insupportable, has been sweetened by this simple means. "We have tried the above receipt, and find that the chloride removes the rancid taste of the butter, making it suitable for cooking, but scarcely purified enough for table use.

1627. To Preserve Milk

1627.    To Preserve Milk. The following receipt appears in Cosmos: "To every liter (about 1 quart) of unskimmed milk, previously poured into a well-annealed glass bottle, add 40 centigrammes (about 6 grains) of bicarbonate of soda. Place the bottle (which must be well corked) containing the milk for about 4 hours in a water-bath, heated to 194° Fahr. On being taken out, the bottle is to be varnished over with tar; and in that state the milk contained in it will keep sound and sweet for several weeks."