Much butter on sale today is a denatured factory product, almost as unpalatable as margarine. But real butter is, literally, la crème de la crème: the carrier of the aromas and flavours of the cream from which it is made. Coming from the milk of a particular herd grazing particular pastures, it is a unique essence of place. Happily for butter lovers, nutritionists now give it their stamp of approval because the milk and meat of grass-fed cattle grazing organic pastures are good sources of Omega 3.
I am passionate about real butter and seek out its makers whenever I can. My latest find is Glenilen Farm in County Cork, where the cattle outnumber people, grazing is lush and the air is unpolluted.
Like many small dairy farmers, young Valerie and Alan Kingston realised a few years ago that selling all their milk to the local Co-op was no longer viable: it was time to diversify or give up. Valerie tried baking cakes to sell at local farmers' markets and the experience helped them build the confidence to set up a proper business.
Valerie had trained in dairy science and worked in a west African village project, where a German colleague taught her to make quark. The Kingstons decided to convert some of their milk into soft fresh cheese. Then they used the cheese to make cheesecake. They bought a milk separator and made cream. And when there was leftover cream at the end of the week, they made butter - first in a domestic Kenwood food mixer, now in a churn in 80 litre batches. They also make plain creamy yoghurt desserts. All these offerings are lovely, but the star of their show is the butter, with its intense creamy taste and milky aroma.
Alan is the butter-maker. He makes it look easy but experts say it is the most exacting dairy craft, and my heart always flutters a little when the magical transformation is in progress. I peek through the churn window waiting to see the cream "break" and the fat accumulate in "wheat grains", listening for the first splash of buttermilk. After draining off the buttermilk, Alan washes the butter with chilled fresh water. Then he "works" the butter and salts it, expelling surplus moisture and rendering the fat silky.
The finished butter is chilled, then cut into 2kg pieces, slapped with large Scotch hands (traditional ribbed wooden butter boards) and shaped into edible gold ingots. The ingots are cut into 250g slices for sale. Slicing reveals gentle folds in the butter, signalling that it is handmade, unlike factory-made butter, squashed so flat that all the life has been squeezed out of it. Each slice is wrapped in greaseproof paper, overwrapped with a band of brown wrapping paper, labelled and tied with twine. The label bears the simple legend "Country butter from West Cork, made on the family farm by Alan and Valerie Kingston".
To date, the Kingstons have made butter just once a fortnight, but new butter developments are being explored. One idea is to speckle sweetcream butter with flakes of sea salt, to make an Irish version of Brittany's beurre au sel de Geurande. Another is to revive the traditional method of making butter from raw cream that has been allowed to ripen before churning, instead of using cream that has been pasteurised and refrigerated to keep it sweet (the norm in the British Isles, north America and New Zealand).
Butter made the older way is sometimes called lactic-ripened - because lactic acids develop in raw cream that is left to stand. These acids sour the cream, and lactic-ripened butter is, so to speak, the butter equivalent of crème fraîche with all the extra flavour dimensions that implies.
Historically, a crucial part of the butter-maker's skills lay in judging when cream was ready to churn - when it was sufficiently aged to display a nutty flavoursome edge, but not over the top and going off. These days, lactic-ripened effects are more often achieved by adding lactic ferments or cultures to fresh cream.
The Kingstons are keen to try making lactic butter in the traditional way, without cultures. Their parents on both sides remember making butter like this, so they will join forces in the venture; trials are due to start this spring. If all goes to plan, lactic butter will then be churned to order. The local Department of Agriculture inspector sees no problem in going back to go forward, providing the product is labelled unpasteurised. Myrtle Allen, leading light in the renaissance of traditional Irish foods and cooking, has expressed great interest personally and for her hotel, Ballymaloe House.
In the box are the details of six of the best butter-makers I know in the British Isles. For the sake of good eating and the survival of this craft, we ought to patronise them. If we do not, we shall have only ourselves to blame if they - and real butter - disappear, leaving us with no choice but to rely on mass-market mediocrity.
BUYING BETTER
Ireland
Salted sweetcream butter made from lightly pasteurised cream (and, hopefully, lactic- ripened butter in due course). 60 Friesians and Jersey-Friesian crossbreeds. Valerie and Alan Kingston, Glenilen Farm, Co. Cork, tel: +353 (0)283 1179
Scotland
Unsalted lactic-cultured organic butter made from pasteurised cream. 25 Ayshires. Pam Rodway, Wester Lawrenceton Farm, Moray, tel: +44 (0)1309 676 566
Wales
Salted and unsalted sweetcream butter made from raw cream. 40 Jerseys. Maisie and Maurice Randerson, The Jersey Farm, Cardiganshire, tel: +44 (0)1239-621 658
Cornwall
Salted and unsalted sweetcream butter made from organic cream. 60 Jerseys. Nick and Barbara Michell, Barwick Farm, Truro, tel: +44 (0)1872-530 528
Norfolk
Unsalted sweetcream butter made from raw organic cream. 16 Jerseys. Bertie and Jane Capon, Domini Quality Foods, Diss, tel: +44 (0)135-9221 240
Wiltshire
Salted/unsalted sweetcream butter made from pasteurised organic cream. 80 Guernseys. Christine Gosling, Berkeley Farm Dairy, Wroughton, tel +44 (0)1793-812 228
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