2 CLEAN MILK 



in the endeavor to secure good milk or milk-products results from 

 the contamination of milk with undesirable germs. Thus the 

 proper taste, odor, color, consistency and keeping qualities of milk 

 'depend upon its comparative freedom from undesirable germs. 

 Conversely, the souring of milk and faults in odor, color, consist- 

 ency and taste depend almost wholly upon the presence of one or 

 more varieties of germs. 



Moreover, the prevention of contamination of milk with miscel- 

 laneous germs is just as important in order to make the best pro- 

 ducts from milk, as it is to avoid disease in man. Thus the finest 

 cream is only produced from milk in which germs are comparatively 

 absent. Cream laden with miscellaneous germs has bad keeping 

 qualities and often a faulty taste or odor. Most of the so-called. 

 faults of butter arise not from improper feeding of cows or from 

 improper making or handling of butter, but from undesirable germs 

 which infest it. Among some of the more common faults of butter 

 are poor flavor, tallowy or oily butter, butter having a bitter, rotten 

 or root-taste like turnips, rancid, mottled and moldy butter, and 

 butter of unusual colors; all of these faults have been proved to be 

 due to the contamination of butter with germs which existed in the 

 milk. 



While germs in milk produce changes in cheese which give rise 

 to its proper consistency and flavor, yet it is only a certain type or 

 types of germs which are desirable, and a general pollution of milk 

 with germs of many kinds may wholly unfit milk for cheese making. 



It is essential that milk should be pure when employed for 

 condensing, and, although germs are destroyed in the process, this 

 is much more readily accomplished if the milk is clean in the begin- 

 ning and the keeping qualities will be much better. Above all, 

 when milk is sold for general consumption it must be pure — com- 

 paratively germ-free— to be wholesome, to bring a good price, to 

 keep, and to fall within the legal requirements which will soon 

 become general throughout this country. 



