42 DAIRYING 



610. If butter contains 12.00 per cent water one day and 

 15.00 per cent water the next day, the difference between the 

 two lots amounts to 3 pounds in every 100 pounds of butter 

 made. This 3 pounds is worth 90 cents, if butter is 30 cents per- 

 pound and if 300 pounds are made daily, the difference is worth 

 $2.70, which is more than the buttermaker's wages in some 

 cases. 



611. Water is held by butter as a film around each granule 

 and in the pockets between the granules. The smaller the 

 granules the greater the amount of butter surface and conse- 

 quently the larger the amount of adhering water. On the other 

 hand the larger and the more irregular the granules, the more 

 and the larger are the pockets to be filled with water. The 

 amount of water held by the butter is influenced therefore by 

 certain conditions which the buttermaker should understand. 

 Some of these are the following: 



A rich cream churned warm in a churn filled to its full 

 capacity brings butter in waxy granules which contain an excess 

 of water. 



Effect of Size of Butter Granules on Water Content of Butter. 



612. It has been shown in previous pages that salts helps to 

 expel the moisture in butter and since the salt will be more thor- 

 oughly and uniformly mixed with small than with large butter 

 granules, it seems fair to infer that the water contents of 

 butter will be increased by churning to large granules and 

 decreased by churning to small granules before the salt is 

 added to them. 



The standard size of butter granules is that of wheat 

 kernels, as it has been found that the curd can be more easily 

 washed out, and the salt more uniformly worked into such 

 butter than is the case when it is gathered in larger lumps. 

 The objection to stopping the churn when the butter granules 

 are still finer than wheat comes from the possibility of 

 mechanical loss of those fine granules in the buttermilk. 



