AN EASY WAY OF MAKING BUTTER IN WINTER.—The following will be found an excellent method of making butter in cold weather for family use. We recommend its trial. Take, in the morning, the unskimmed milk of the preceding evening, (after it has stood all night in a tin pan,) and set it over a furnace of hot coals, or in a stove; being careful not to disturb the cream that has risen to the surface. Let it remain over the fire till it simmers, and begins to bubble round the edges; but on no account let it come to a boil. Then take the pan carefully off, (without disturbing the cream) and carry it to a cool place, but not where it is cold enough to freeze. In the evening, take a spoon, and loosen the cream round the sides of the pan. If very rich it will be almost a solid cake. Slip off the sheet of cream into another and larger pan; letting as little milk go with it as possible. Cover it, and set it away. Repeat the process for several days, till you have thus collected a sufficiency of clotted cream to fill the pan. Then scald a wooden ladle, and beat the cream hard with it during ten minutes. You will then have excellent butter. Take it out of the pan; lay it on a flat dish; and with the ladle, squeeze and press it hard, till all the butter-milk is entirely extracted and drained off. Then wash the butter in cold water, and work a very little salt into it. Set it away in a cool place for three hours. Then squeeze and press it again; also washing it a second time in cold water. Make it up into pats, and keep it in a cool place.
The unskimmed morning’s milk, of course, may also be used for this purpose, after it has stood twelve hours. The simmering over the fire adds greatly to the quantity of cream, by throwing all the oily part of the milk to the surface; but if allowed to boil, this oleaginous matter will again descend, and mix with the rest, so as not to be separated.
This is the usual method of making winter butter in the south of England; and it is very customary in the British provinces of America. Try it.
COCHINEAL COLOURING.—Take an ounce of cochineal, and pound it to a fine powder. Put it into an earthen or porcelain vessel, that is quite clean, and entirely free from grease. Add a small salt-spoonful of potash, or soda, and pour in a pint of clear, soft water. Set it over the fire; and, when it has come to a boil, add a quarter of an ounce of cream of tartar, with a quarter of an ounce of powdered alum; and let it boil ten minutes. Then, while it is boiling hot, stir in three ounces of powdered loaf-sugar. Bottle it, when cold, and keep it closely corked. You can then have it always at hand, as a fine red colouring for icings, blanc-mange, creams, jellies, and other sweetmeats.
COLOURING FOR CHEESE.—An ounce of real Spanish arnotta will colour fifty pounds of cheese. Tie up the arnotta, in a thin linen rag, and put it, over-night, into half a pint of warm water. In the morning, put the arnotta-water into the tub of milk, along with the infusion of rennet, indispensable in making cheese. For a deeper tint, dip the bag into the milk, and squeeze it as long as any colour runs out.
ALKANET COLOURING.—Alkanet is now much used for giving a beautiful red colour to confectionary. It is much cheaper than cochineal, and more easily prepared. It has no peculiar taste, and no unwholesome properties. You can purchase it at any druggist’s, and at a trifling cost. It comes in small, dark-red chips. Before using it, pick it clean, and see that there is none of the dust or powder remaining about it. Tie up some of the alkanet chips, in a bit of very thin, clean muslin, like a small bag, and let it infuse with the mixture you wish to colour. It either may, or may not be boiled.