Listing description
Butter is a solid dairy product made by churning fresh or fermented cream or milk, to
separate the butterfat from the buttermilk. It is generally used as a spread on plain or toasted bread products and a condiment on cooked vegetables, as well as in cooking, such as baking, sauce making, and pan frying. Butter consists of butterfat, milk proteins and water.
Detailed description
Most frequently made from cows' milk,
butter can also be manufactured from the milk of other mammals,
including sheep, goats, buffalo, and yaks. Salt such as dairy
salt, flavorings and preservatives are sometimes added to butter. Rendering butter produces clarified
butter or ghee, which
is almost entirely butterfat.
Butter is a water-in-oil emulsion resulting from an inversion of the cream;
in a water-in-oil emulsion, the milk proteins are the emulsifiers. Butter
remains a solid when refrigerated, but
softens to a spreadable consistency at room
temperature, and melts to a thin liquid consistency at 32–35 °C
(90–95 °F). The density of butter is 911 g/L (0.950 lbs per US pint).[1]
It generally has a pale yellow color, but varies from deep yellow to
nearly white. Its unmodified color is dependent on the animals' feed and is
commonly manipulated with food
colorings in the
commercial manufacturing process, most commonly annatto or carotene.
Types
Before modern factory butter making, cream was usually collected
from several milkings and was therefore several days old and somewhat fermented
by the time it was made into butter. Butter made from a fermented cream is
known as cultured butter.
During fermentation, the cream naturally sours as bacteria convert milk
sugars into lactic
acid. The fermentation process produces additional aroma compounds,
including diacetyl, which makes for a fuller-flavored
and more "buttery" tasting product.[10](p35) Today, cultured butter is usually made from
pasteurized cream whose fermentation is produced by the introduction of Lactococcus and Leuconostoc bacteria.
Another method for producing cultured butter, developed in the
early 1970s, is to produce butter from fresh cream and then incorporate
bacterial cultures and lactic acid. Using this method, the cultured butter
flavor grows as the butter is aged in cold storage. For manufacturers, this
method is more efficient, since aging the cream used to make butter takes
significantly more space than simply storing the finished butter product. A
method to make an artificial simulation of cultured butter is to add lactic
acid and flavor compounds directly to the fresh-cream butter; while this more
efficient process is claimed to simulate the taste of cultured butter, the
product produced is not cultured but is instead flavored.
Dairy products are often pasteurized during production to kill pathogenic bacteria and other microbes.
Butter made from pasteurized fresh cream is called sweet cream butter. Production
of sweet cream butter first became common in the 19th century, with the
development of refrigeration and the mechanical cream
separator.[10](p33) Butter made from fresh or cultured
unpasteurized cream is called raw
cream butter. While butter made from pasteurized cream may keep for several
months, raw cream butter has a shelf
life of
roughly ten days.
Throughout continental Europe, cultured butter is preferred,
while sweet cream butter dominates in the United States and the United
Kingdom. Cultured butter is sometimes labeled
"European-style" butter in the United States, although cultured
butter is made and sold by some, especially Amish, dairies. Commercial raw
cream butter is virtually unheard-of in the United States. Raw cream butter is
generally only found made at home by consumers who have purchased raw whole
milk directly from dairy farmers, skimmed the cream themselves, and made butter
with it. It is rare in Europe as well.[10](p34)
Several "spreadable" butters have been developed.
These remain softer at colder temperatures and are therefore easier to use
directly out of refrigeration. Some methods modify the makeup of the butter's
fat through chemical manipulation of the finished product, some manipulate the
cattle's feed, and some incorporate vegetable
oil into
the butter. "Whipped" butter, another product designed to be more
spreadable, is aerated by incorporating nitrogen gas—normal air is not used to avoid oxidation and rancidity.
All categories of butter are sold in both salted and unsalted
forms. Either granular salt or a strong brine are added to salted butter during
processing. In addition to enhanced flavor, the addition of salt acts as a preservative. The
amount of butterfat in the finished product is a vital aspect
of production. In the United States, products sold as "butter" must
contain at least 80% butterfat. In practice, most American butters contain
slightly more than that, averaging around 81% butterfat. European butters
generally have a higher ratio—up to 85%.
Clarified butter is
butter with almost all of its water and milk solids removed, leaving
almost-pure butterfat. Clarified butter is made by heating butter to its melting
point and
then allowing it to cool; after settling, the remaining components separate by
density. At the top, whey proteins form a skin, which is removed. The
resulting butterfat is then poured off from the mixture of water and casein proteins that settle to the bottom.
Ghee is clarified butter that has been heated to
around 120 °C (250 °F) after the water evaporated, turning the milk
solids brown. This process flavors the ghee, and also produces antioxidants that help protect it from rancidity.
Because of this, ghee can keep for six to eight months under normal conditions.
PRICE
$35.27/KG OR
$16.03/IB
For more information:
mobile: +2348039721941
contact person: emeaba uche
e-mail: emeabau@yahoo.com
website: www.franchiseminerals.com
