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See also: Food Eating Contests; Margarine
BUTTER
Salted butter has up to 2 1/2% salt added to extend its keeping qualities.
A Buttery has nothing to do with butter. It was originally a room where liquors were stored, later a place at universities where students could buy provisions, and then a place where food was served (a restaurant).
Most butter has a moisture content of 16% to 18%.
Butter is made from the milk of cows, sheep, goats, donkeys, horses, water buffaloes, and yaks. Camel's milk has very small fat globules and is difficult to churn into butter.
Butter has been colored yellow since the 14th century.
The first creameries (butter factories) in the U.S. began operation around 1860 in New York State.
By 1879 total factory butter production was 29 million pounds; in 1909 production was 627 million pounds and by 1921 production was over 1 billion pounds. Butter production peaked in 1940 at 2.2 billion pounds.
During WW II there were quotas on butter and margarine production rose dramatically as butter production fell off.
In 2009 U.S. Butter production was more than 1.5 billion pounds.(1,573,481,000 pounds) (USDA, 2010)
Many curious items have been preserved in Irish bogs, even complete human bodies. Recently (2009) another unusual item was found by workers for a peat company - a 3,000 year old wooden barrel of butter!
The butter is not actually butter any longer, it has been transformed into 'adipocere,' a wax-like substance formed from animal fat. (Adipocere is also known as mortuary wax or grave wax, as human body fat may also turn to adipocere under the right conditions - cold, humid, and the absence of oxygen.) Archaeology (Nov-Dec 2009)
Butter has been colored yellow since at least the 1300s. During the Middle Ages it was colored with marigold flowers.
It takes about 21 pounds of whole milk to make 1 pound of butter.
Whipped butter is made by whipping nitrogen gas into the butter. The oxygen in normal air would promote oxidation and rancidity, but nitrogen gas is non-reactive.
In 1957 margarine consumption overtook butter consumption for the first time in the U.S. Per capita consumption of butter was 8.3 pounds and margarine was 8.6 pounds.
Powdered butter was developed in Australia in 1962.
The world record for butter eating is 7 quarter pound sticks of salted butter in 5 minutes by Donald Lerman.
BUTTER GRADES
U.S. Grade AA Butter:
• Delicate sweet flavor, with a fine highly pleasing aroma;
• made from high-quality fresh sweet cream;
• smooth, creamy texture with good spreadability;
• salt completely dissolved and blended.
U.S. Grade A Butter:
• pleasing flavor;
• made from fresh sweet cream;
• fairly smooth texture;
• rates close to the top grade.
U.S. Grade B Butter:
• may have slightly acid flavor;
• generally made from selected sour cream;
• acceptable by many consumers.
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