Butter 101

Well, I didn't make it to War Practice after all, because we were all sick. However, I have officially signed up with the Pennsic University to teach Butter 101 twice (7/25 at 10am AS10; 7/30 at 5pm AS11), and gotten time off from work. So I should be there, assuming disaster doesn't strike.

Butter 101 came out of a class I took early on in my SCA career at the children's area. Basically, we just shook heavy cream in a container with a toothpick, and voila! Butter for feast! I stole this idea and taught it at the children's area at one of our local events, but I ended up shaking all the containers myself as the kids lost interest.

Finally I decided that adults might be interested in making butter, and have a longer attention span. Fresh butter is lovely, and much appreciated at any feast. However, to teach a proper class at a proper academy, one must have documentation and history to go with it. It's not really enough to say "butter is period, and we're making it". So I did some very basic research and wrote up a paper. I'm sure it's lacking in some areas, and it will probably continue to evolve, but here it is.

Butter Making 101

 

History

 Butter has been around for at least 6000 years. It is first mentioned in the middle east, but any culture that has cows has butter as well.

It has been made in Western Europe for at least 3000 years, probably longer.

The oldest "butter" ever found was buried in peat bogs in Scotland and Ireland. Between 3000 and 1000BCE they buried wooden barrels full of meat or dairy fat. It is unknown whether these were caches which were then forgotten, or whether there was some significance to their burial. 

The earliest butter was made by shaking cream in skin bags.

  

In the middle ages, once the cows were milked, the milk was set out to separate in pans.

After it separated, the dairy maid would skim the cream off the top. Then the cream was set in pans to sour slightly before it was put into the churn.

The churn was made of wooden staves held together by metal bands (much like a bucket), with a lid with a central hole through which the churn dash would go. The churn dash was a thick rod with a wooden piece on the end of it that fit within the churn’s diameter. The piece on the end would be square or round, with holes in it to allow the liquid through.

The dairy maid would then pick up and push down the churn dash over and over to agitate the cream until it separated into butter and buttermilk.

After she finished making the butter she would then knead it, which would allow the butter to be more uniform, and would get rid of more of the liquid, making it less likely for the butter to go rancid.

The butter would then be shaped or molded, and then kept in earthenware pots, or slabs wrapped in cabbage leaves.

 Different cultures have used all different types of mammal milk to create butter, or even used non-dairy fat to spread on their bread.

Mongols, for instance, who depend largely on dairy for their sustenance, use the milk of whatever mammals they care for in their region, including goats, camels, yaks, and horses. 

In the Medieval period, cows were not bred to type as they are now. There were no standards to breed to, so breeding was done to emphasize what was needed from the cow: larger quantities or better qualities of milk, or meat.

Breeds which are similar to medieval breeds of cattle include: Ancient White Park, British White, Devon, English Longhorn, Jersey, Guernsey, Norfolk, Suffolk, Kerry, Monte de Cassel, Veurne-Ambacht, East Flanders Red, and East Flanders White. In Ireland and Scotland, cattle were black, white, or red. 

Cattle were so important in the Celtic cultures that wars were fought over them. The Táin Bó Cúailnge epic is set in the first century CE, but the surviving manuscripts are 12th century. The main story centers around two super-fertile bulls and their value as personal wealth.

The Science

Butter is 80% milk fats and milk nonfat solids, 15-18% water, and 3% vitamins, calcium, phosphorus, protein, and salt (if added).

When agitated, air is drawn into the cream, mixing fat with water, and creating foam. The fat globules push against each other, breaking the exterior membrane and bonding together to make larger globules. This stable foam is what we call whipped cream.

With more agitation, the fat globules overbalance the air cells, the foam collapses, and leaks, creating butter and buttermilk.

The buttermilk which results from making butter is not the same as the buttermilk we buy in the store for making biscuits. Biscuit buttermilk is fermented, which is why it reacts with baking powder to create gas which inflates the biscuit dough to make it "light and fluffy". Modern dairies innoculate the cream with specific organisms, rather than leaving it out to let those organisms in the air innoculate it. This avoids the risk of it being innoculated with unexpected and potentially dangerous organisms. They do the same with cream that will be turned into butter.

Churning Songs

Hand churning takes a long time, and thus it became common to make up songs or charms to keep the dairymaid’s mind busy and to encourage the change from cream to butter to happen more quickly. Here are a few:

 1. (chant)

Come butter, come, come,

Come butter, come

Peter stands at the gate

Waiting for a buttered cake

Come butter, come, come

Come butter, come

2. (to the tune of “Farmer in the Dell”)

Churn churn churn

This is churning day

Till the golden butter comes

The dasher must not stay

Pat pat pat

Make it smooth and round

Now the golden butter’s done

Won’t you buy a pound?

 

3.

Churn, butter, churn,

In a cow’s horn;

I never see’d such butter,

Sin’ I was born.

Peter’s standing at the gate

Waiting for a butter’d cake,

Come butter, come

4.

Churn, butter, churn

Come, butter, come

A little good butter

Is better than none.

5. Churn Lilt

Oh, Mary had a churning
A-down by the wick (dairy house)
Sweet milk she would be turning

All into butter thick

Quick come butter, quick, butter

Milk and sweet butter

Quick come butter quick!

Would butter but come quickly

Full blither were we, I wist (wist= know)

With butter to the elbow

Buttermilk up to the wrist

Quick come butter, quick, butter

Milk and sweet butter

Quick come butter quick

Charm of the Churn

THIG na saor, thig;
Thig na daor, thig;
Thig na caor, thig;
Thig na maor, thig;
Thig na faor, thig;
Thig na baor, thig;
Thig na gaor, thig;
Thig na caoch, thig;
Thig na caon, thig;
Thig na caomh, thig;
Thig na gaol, thig;
Thig na claon, thig;
Thig fear a churraig bhuidhe,
Chuireas am muighe na ruith.

Thig na saora,
Thig na daora,
Thig na caora,
Thig na maora,
Thig na faora,
Thig na baora,
Thig na gaora,
Thig na caocha,
Thig na caona,
Thig na caomha,
Thig na gaola,
Thig na claona,
Thig loma lan na cruinne,
Chur a mhuighe na ruith;
Thig Calum caomh na uidheam,
'S thig Bride bhuidhe chruidh.

Tha glug a seo,
Tha glag a seo,
Tha glag a seo,
Tha glug a seo,
Tha slug a seo,
Tha slag a seo,
Tha slag a seo,
Tha slug a seo,
Tha seilcheag mhor bhog a seo,
Tha brigh gach te dhe'n chrodh a seo,
Tha rud is foir na mil us beoir, fearr
Tha bocan buidhe nodh a seo.

COME will the free, come;
Come will the bond, come;
Come will the bells, come;
Come will the maers, come;
Come will the blade, come;
Come will the sharp, come;
Come will the hounds, come;
Come will the wild, come;
Come will the mild, come;
Come will the kind, come;
Come will the loving, come;
Come will the squint, come;
Come will he of the yellow cap,
That will set the churn a-running.

The free will come,
The bond will come,
The bells will come,
The mares will come,
The blades will come,
The sharp will come,
The hounds will come,
The wild will come,
The mild will come,
The kind will come,
The loving will come,
The devious will come,
The brim-full of the globe will come,
To set the churn a-running;
Kindly Columba will come in his array,
And the golden-haired Bride of the kine.  

 A splash is here,
A plash is here,
A plash is here,
A splash is here,
A crash is here,
A squash is here,
A squash is here,
A crash is here,
A big soft snail is here,
The sap of each of the cows is here,
A thing better than honey and spruce,
A bogle yellow and fresh is here.

(continues for several more stanzas)

At Home Method

To make butter quickly and easily at home, use heavy cream (not ultra-pasteurized, but pasteurized or raw is fine). Pour it into a container with a lid, and add something clean to agitate it with (a marble, a toothpick, or something similar). Shake and shake and shake some more. Keep going past the point where you think it will be done.

The cream will become whipped (you’ll be able to tell—it will double in volume), and then when you hear a wet slapping against the side of the container, look inside to see if it’s done. You will see a thin white liquid and a thick yellow or yellow-white blob of butter. It will probably not be very smooth, unless you’ve been shaking the thing in a cement mixer or something.

Pour off the buttermilk (it’s fine to drink, or use in baking in place of milk—remember this is not fermented, so you probably shouldn’t use it in place of cultured buttermilk).

Add water to the container and shake some more, then pour off the resulting milky water.

Knead the butter until it feels smooth and mostly dry.

Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator, or use immediately.

You can also add salt, herbs, spices, or honey. I particularly like adding roasted or raw garlic to make garlic-toast.

An alternate method would be to use a churn of some sort, or an egg beater.

References

3000 year old butter discovered in Ireland. IrishCentral.com. Antoinette Kelly. January 14, 2012. <http://irishcentral.com/news/3000-year-old-butter-discovered-in-Ireland-54310297.html>

Butter, Gastronomie Medievale. Bibliotheque National de France. January 14, 2012.

<http://expositions.bnf.fr/gastro/enimages/anglais/index.htm>.

Most of the medieval images came from here, and their original sources are:

Tacuinum Sanitatus, 15^th century: Le Façonnage de Fromage, La Preparacion de Beurre, Le Fromage.

  

Butter Manufacture. Dairy Science and Technology, University of Guelph. January 14, 2012. <http://www.foodsci.uoguelph.ca/dairyedu/butter.html>.

Churning Song 1:  Tegg, William. The Year Book of Daily Recreation and Information. London: William Tegg, 1832.

Churning Songs 2 and 3: collected by the Berea College Hutchins Library Special Collections and Archives in the Leonard Roberts Papers. January 14, 2012.

<http://music2.appstate.edu/AMSSG/Primary/forlinksprim/prim1/prim1songs.pdf>

Churning Songs 4: Baker, Anne Elizabeth. Glossary of Northamptonshire Words and Phrases. London: John Russell Smith, 1854.

Churning Lilt: Mursell, James L., et al. Music for Living, Book Three, Now and Long Ago. California State Series, California State Dept. of Education, Sacramento 1958. p 103.

Charm of the Churn: Carmichael, Alexander. Carmina Gadelica: Hymns and Incantations. Edinburgh, 1900.

Churning Songs 1 and 4, Churn Lilt and Charm of the Churn were found on: Churn Songs, Mudcat.org. January 14, 2012. <http://mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=119475>

Da Costa Hours, April, 1515.

Helweg, Richard. Complete Guide To Making Cheese, Butter, And Yogurt At Home. Atlantic Publishing Group, 2010.

Le Compost et Kalendrierdes Bergeres, Paris, 1499.

Meyer, Carolyn. Milk, Butter, and Cheese: Story of Dairy Products. Morrow, 1974.

Tain Bo Cuailnge from the Book of Leinster, translation by Cecil O'Rahilly