i;rriKi; 



DAIRY FARMING 



Butter 



milk, tin- fermenting agent being added when it is nearly cold. 

 Ami flu- milk. leiiii_' boiled immediately as obtained from the cow, contains 

 all its l.-it or luitter. In this form it is called sara, and if kept hot may be 

 ai ( iimulated for some days till sufficient has been collected to form it into 

 tin ft i. This, as Banerjei explains, is therefore basa-dahi. If butter be 

 removed from the dahi by churning, the liquid that remains is butter-milk 

 or if/ml -dahi (mdthd, lassi). But a top layer of the dahi may be simply 

 ski mmt '(I off and used in the manufacture of butter. Hence there may 

 holt- -milk dahi (basa-dahi), skimmed-milk dahi,&& well as butter-milk 

 (<//i< >l -<lalt i). Dahi in the liquid state is largely consumed ; hence its whey 

 (iioixtu) contains all the milk-sugar and its curd (chhena) may or may not 

 have embedded in it all the butter-fat. Whole-milk dahi thus contains 

 too much fat to be made into cheese. It is, in fact, cream-cheese, and some 

 localities such as Bandel near Hughli and Dacca in Eastern Bengal are 

 famous for their cream-cheeses. When curds are intended to be prepared 

 t he acid or rennet is added to the hot milk. This is called dud-chhena, but 

 ilafii is often heated and allowed to cool in order to prepare imitation curds 

 known as dahi-chhena. The whey (as it may be called) of dahi is separated 

 by pressing the curd within a clean cloth, but if it be completely dried 

 the chhena crumbles to a powder. All qualities of dahi and also of 

 chhena are largely used in cookery and with khir constitute the chief 

 ingredients of sweetmeats, which may thus be regarded as possessing 

 all the elements of food and are not merely luxuries like the sweetmeats 

 of Europe. 



Trade. The trade in compressed (or partially compressed) dahi is 

 very extensive, and within a radius around the chief cities immense quan- 

 tities are daily conveyed by rail and road from the country to the towns, 

 the curd being wrapped in damp cloths and deposited in open baskets. 

 Dahi and ghi are therefore the products of greatest value in Indian dairy 

 farming. Although every resident in India will readily admit that the 

 traffic must be enormous, no sort of computation is possible of the total 

 production of either the one or the other product. 



But in conclusion it may be pointed out that the fermentative agents 

 concerned in the coagulation of sour milk (not boiled), of boiled milk (dahi), 

 of soured cream and of the various forms of curds (chhena), are probably 

 all different and that success in the production of the manufactures named, 

 to a far greater extent than as yet appreciated, depends on the use of the 

 correct agent for each fermentation. [Cf. Sen, I.e. Dacca, 1889, 54-7 ; 

 Banerjei, Agri. Cuttack, 1893, 128-30.] 



3. BUTTER. Of India it may be said that two kinds of butter are 

 known : nani or the butter of fresh or only scalded milk, and mdkhan or 

 the butter of soured milk (dahi}. The former is held to be inferior and 

 more difficult to prepare than the latter, but valued because the butter- 

 milk obtained may be sold as dahi, and khir may even be made from it. 

 Fresh milk is hardly ever set on one side to allow of the rise of the butter, 

 and in consequence cream (shar) can hardly be said to be known in India. 

 The article sold as cream (except that obtained by the modern cream 

 separators) would more correctly be described as liquid (boiled) butter 

 mixed with dahi. But the so-called Indian cream (as with the cream of 

 Europe) is set aside to mature or ripen (as it is called), and when sufficient 

 has been collected and matured it is churned and made into butter. Terry 

 (chaplain to Sir Thomas Roe) (Voy. E. Ind. (ed. Havers), 1665, 359) 



475 



Km l,,.f 



Dahi. 



Whey. 

 Curd. 



Cteam-cbeeie. 



CIJtena. 



Trade in 

 Dahi. 



Internal. 



Fermentation 

 Agents. 



D.E.P., 

 i., 556. 

 Butter. 



Crv.un. 



Early 

 Mention. 



