CARE OF THE MILK IOI 



rapidly and as perfectly as experiment and ex- 

 perience direct. 



KEEPING THE CREAM SWEET 



Until the commencement of the ripening process 

 immersion in ice-cold water is all that is needed to 

 keep the cream sweet as successive skimmings are 

 added. Cream may be kept sweet in this manner for 

 three or four days in summer without injury. If 

 perfect butter is to be made the cream must be 

 ripened in one body. If several cans of cream, taken 

 from the same body, be set in a room kept at a uni- 

 form temperature, they will not all ripen together and 

 reach the proper condition for churning at the same 

 time. There will often be four or five hours' dif- 

 ference. In the ripening of cream there is a point at 

 which, if churned, butter of a delicate nutty flavor 

 can be secured. If churned too soon or too late this is 

 lost. The result is a loss of several cents a pound 

 from the market value of the product. 



A STARTER 



It has already been stated that the ripening of 

 cream is the development of the bacteria of fermen- 

 tation. Perfect butter depends largely upon this de- 

 velopment being perfect. In all cream there are 

 more or less foreign bacteria detrimental to the 

 production of first-class butter. It is important that 

 the proper bacteria be developed rapidly and ahead 

 of the other forms existing in the cream. To do 

 this the cream ready to ripen should be thoroughly 

 inoculated with the proper kind of bacteria, instead 

 of awaiting the slower process of natural develop- 



