IQ2 BACTERIA IN BUTTER. 



Both of these stages of cream ripening must have an im- 

 portant influence upon the product. That the production of 

 lactic acid has an important influence is beyond question. 

 The presence of lactic acid is one of the essential factors in 

 the churning, and the slight acid taste due to this acid is one 

 of the factors of the butter flavor. But it is extremely prob- 

 able that the first phase of cream ripening has also an im- 

 portant influence upon the final product. The decomposition 

 products developed by the bacteria growing during the first 

 few hours, and which cause more or less of a destruction 

 of the albuminoids are, at least, very likely to contribute to 

 the final product of the butter flavor. Indeed, there seems to 

 be very good a priori reason for this. The butter flavor, 

 when it becomes a little too strong, has a very decided tinge 

 of a putrefactive taste. People accustomed to the mild- 

 flavored European butter tell us that the American butter 

 frequently tastes decayed. Now the lactic bacteria do not 

 produce these odors and flavors of decay but simply lac- 

 tic acid. It, therefore, follows that the peculiar flavors, 

 of American butter at all events, must be attributed in part 

 to the action of the type of bacteria that produce albuminoid 

 decomposition. In other words, it seems that the flavor of 

 butter is not a simple phenomenon, but a somewhat complex 

 one. It is dependent partly upon the presence of lactic acid, 

 which undoubtedly imparts a flavor, but, at least in the Amer- 

 ican butter, it is dependent also in part upon some of the 

 other ingredients in cream, produced by some of the bacteria 

 that develop in the first period of ripening, during which the 

 miscellaneous bacteria grow rapidly and become abundant. 

 To the bacteria producing albuminoid decomposition, the 

 peptonizing bacteria, we must attribute a part of the butter's 

 flavor. 



Why Ripening is Ordinarily Satisfactory. The facts just 

 outlined explain why the ripening of cream is ordinarily satis- 

 factory in spite of the fact that the cream is almost sure to be 



