174 ILIjTNOIS state DAIRYMiE'N'S ASS OCI ATTORN. 



these* two extremes and consequently should test the ripeness 

 of each lot of cream and govern the ripening accordingly, in 

 order to secure a uniformity in the ripeness of each lot of 

 cream when it is churned. 



ALKALINE TABLET TEST. 



Your Secretary has requested me to explain the use of 

 alkaline tablets for testing the acidity of either milk or cream, 

 and show how they can be used to aid the butter maker in ob- 

 taining uniformity in the ripeness of cream. 



Each one of the tablets contains a standard amount of 

 alkali, and by dissolving them in a certain amount of water, 

 the solution thus obtained will be of st.^ndard strength. 

 When this colored liquid is poured into a certain amount of 

 cream in a white cup the cream remains uncolored until all 

 its acid is neutralized. As soon as the acidity of the cream 

 is completely neutralized by the tablet solution the cream in 

 the cup becomes pink colored and the operator notes how 

 much tablet solution is required to produce this pink color in 

 the cream. 



The process is something like measuring the sourness of 

 lemonade by finding out how many lumps of sugar, of a cer- 

 tain size, it is necessary to add to the lemon juice in order to 

 make it sweet. The sourer the lemonade the more sugar is 

 required to sweeten it, and so the ripe cream takes more tablet 

 solution to produce the pink color than a sweet cream. The 

 amount of acidity in the cream is indicated by the amount of 

 tablet solution used in each test. 



THE STANDARD SOLUTION. 



The standard tablet solution is easly made of a convenient 

 strength by dissolving five tablets in fifty centimeters of water 

 in a graduated cylinder. A twenty-centimeter pipette is used 

 for measuring the cream and the per cent, of acidity in the 

 cream is found by multiplying by two the number of centi- 

 meters of tablet solution required to produce the pink color 

 in the 20 c. c. of cream. Each centimeter of tablet solution is 

 approximately equal to two-hundredths of one per cent, of 

 acidity, so that 10 c. c, tablet solution represents about 0.2 per 

 cent, acid, 20 c. c. 0.4 per cent., 25 c. c. 0.5 per cent acid, and so 

 on. 



