56 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



fallen into is the keeping of cream too long. No one can make a 

 first-class product of butter under any temperature or under any 

 surroundings whatever who practices keeping the cream for a full 

 week, or any part of the cream for a week ; it will always put on an 

 aged flavor. If that flavor is taken on by the cream it will be 

 carried into the butter, and it will be an imperfect butter and when 

 put into the market will sell under price. In every private dairy, 

 whether with one cow or more, the cream should be churned at 

 least twice a week. 



Question. Would you have the cream closely covered, provided 

 you could have it partly exposed to good air, while it is waiting to 

 be churned? 



Sec. Gilbert. The preference would be that it should not be 

 covered, provided the surroundings are all right. 



Question. Is it the practice at the creameries to cure it without 

 keeping it covered? 



Sec. Gilbert. It is the universal practice at the creameries to 

 keep their cream tanks open ; quite a broad surface is exposed to 

 the atmosphere, and the cream is frequently stirred with ladles so 

 that the change shall take place in all parts alike. 



There are two methods of hastening this ripening process ; one is 

 by, temperature alone, and the other is by adding to the fresh cream 

 when it is taken from the milk, a little cream that is already acid, 

 or putting in an "acid plant," as it is called, and setting the acid to 

 work by contact. This is not practiced in any of the creameries of 

 this state, so far as I know. They simpl}' depend on the tempera- 

 ture. Cream that is brought in fresh one day is easily brought into 

 an acid condition the next by temperature alone. 



Question. Would you prefer to have the cream dish large enough 

 to hold all the cream for one churning, and so keep the cream for each 

 churning always bj' itself? 



Sec. Gilbert. That is a matter of convenience only if you have 

 two or more vessels for holding the cream for a single churning 3-0U 

 want to mix it so that part of the older cream goes into each of the 

 vessels and thus mingles it so that it will be entirely even and alike 

 throughout. 



Now, how far shall this curing process be carried on? This is a 

 ver^' important matter. Butter can be made from sweet cream, 

 but it is a different butter from that which is made from acid cream. 

 Generally New England markets and New England consumers call 



