 | | Description: | | Butter is a dairy product made by churning fresh or fermented cream or milk. It is an everyday food in many parts of the world. Butter consists of butterfat surrounding miniscule droplets consisting mostly of water and milk proteins. Butter from cow's milk is most common, but butter is made from the milk of other mammals as well, including sheep, goats, buffalo, and yaks. Salt, flavorings, or preservatives are sometimes added. Butter is used as a condiment and in cooking applications including baking, sauce making, and frying. Butter can be rendered to produce clarified butter or ghee, which is almost entirely butterfat. Butter is a firm solid when refrigerated, softening to a spreadable consistency at room temperatures. It melts to a thin liquid consistency at a range of around 32–35 °C (90–95 °F). Butter's color is generally a pale yellow, but can vary from deep yellow to nearly white. The color of the butter depends on the animal's feed and is sometimes manipulated with food colorings, most commonly annatto or carotene. The term "butter" is used in the names of products made from pureed nuts or peanuts, such as peanut butter, or from fruits, such as apple butter. Other fats solid at room temperature are also known as "butters"; examples include cocoa butter and shea butter. In general use, the term "butter", unqualified, almost always refers to the dairy product. The word butter, in the English language, derives (via Germanic languages) from the Latin butyrum, borrowed from the Greek boutyron. This may have been a construction meaning "cow-cheese" (bous "ox, cow" + tyros "cheese), or the word may have been borrowed from another language, possibly Scythian. |
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