From kids to adults, everyone loves tasting butter. But do you know how they prepare it? If you wish to know the process just out of curiosity or for business purpose, here are the necessary steps:
1. Preparing Skimmed Milk
Separate around 60% milk fat from the whole milk and pre-heat it between 95°F and 104°F. Next, pass it through a centrifugal separator. The milk separates into skim and the cream as a result.
2. Neutralization & Standardization of Cream
The cream obtained above may have a sour taste, so it undergoes a neutralization process that brings down the lactic acid content in the range 0.09 to 0.14, and PH value in 6.6 to 6.8. The standardization of cream includes 40% fat.
3. Pasteurization of Cream
Pasteurization is a process to eliminate pathogens, destroy or deactivate harmful organisms and enzymes with heat, and extend the shelf life of the butter. After that, leave the cream and let it cool down. You may proceed through two different methods depending on whether you are making salty or sweet butter.
For Salty Butter
Cool the cream between 68°F and 71.6°F and follow the below steps:
Culturing: Adds good bacteria, enzymes, and vitamins to the cream to increase its nutritional value.
Ripening: Causes fermentation of cream using a suitable starter culture. It produces butter with higher diacetyl content and pronounced flavor and aroma.
Proceed with the filling in churn and color addition to leave it for churning.
For Sweet Butter
Cool the cream between 41°F and 50°F.
4. Aging
Salty or sweet – aging is common for both butter types. Allow the butter to settle overnight or for 10 to 12 hours without temperature change. The steps for making the sweet and the salty butter are the same from here on.
5. Churning
Churning is the process of shaking up cream for a homogenous distribution of the constituent granules of the butter. The granules become as big as popcorn.
6. Washing
Wash the churned butter with pasteurized chilled water.
7. Salting
Add 2 to 2.5 percent of salt, as it acts as a disinfectant and adds up to the butter's shelf life.
8. Moisture Adjustment
For storage, it is important to keep the moisture content between 15.8 and 15.9%.
9. Working
Spread the salt and moisture contents of the compact mass thus formed homogeneously with a blender or some other tool.
Now that the process of butter making is complete, you may proceed to do the packing, storage, and distribution tasks.