Things you never knew about beloved butter

Is butter a food group? Let's see…just consulting my trusty Canada Food Guide, and….no.  No? Well they clearly have not spent time in my kitchen, or in any other self-respecting chef's kitchen or farmhouse kitchen for that matter.

All kidding aside, butter truly is a world-wide staple with the exception of dairy-less cultures such as parts of Asia and Japan. But visit a land where domestic animals produce milk for human consumption—from cow to reindeer, yes, I said reindeer—and you'll find a kitchen with its own unique butter.

What is butter?
We all know what butter is, right? It's full-fat cream that has been agitated or churned until it thickens, the fat binding to the milk solids. Have you ever taken your whipped cream a little too far, only to watch it suddenly split, separating the solids from a thin liquid (that liquid is buttermilk), and become butter? Well, this is how it's always been done.

Four thousand years ago, cream was poured into an animal skin or bladder and rocked until it turned to butter. In those days, that cream would have been from goat, sheep, camel, or water buffalo - cows were domesticated much later. These days, we're seeing goat's milk butter again, which is great for folks who have trouble digesting cow's milk. Butter can be made from any high-fat mammal's milk. And long before some clever scientist invented margarine in a lab, butter was all we northern folk had.

Butters around the world
Of course in olive- and palm-growing countries, vegetable oils were always on the table—along with butter—but in much of Europe and North America, butter was the fat of choice for spreading, baking, frying, cooking, preserving, you name it. In warmer regions, it was almost always clarified (removing the milk solids) to delay spoiling, while in cooler climates it could be left whole.

Page 1 of 3 - Read page three to learn about butters of Ireland, India and Ethiopia!