For cheese, the dairy should contain three rooms: one for setting the
milk, with suitable boilers, &c.; next, a press-room, in which the
cheese should be salted, as given under article _Cheese_; the third, a
store-room. In all climates a cheese-house should be made as tight as
possible;--thick stone walls are best; windows should be on two sides,
north and west, but not on opposite sides, so as to create a draught:
this is no better for cheese or butter, and is always dangerous to the
operator. Let all persons who would enjoy good health avoid a draught of
air as they would an arrow. If your cheese-house can be shaded on the
east, south, and west, by trees, and have only a northern exposure, it
will aid you much in guarding against extremes of heat and cold. Windows
should be fitted closely, and covered with wire-cloth on the outside, so
as to exclude all flies.
A dairy for butter needs but two rooms, and a cool, dry cellar, with
windows in north and west. The first room should be for setting and
skimming the milk, and the other for churning and working the butter,
and scalding and cleaning the utensils. If your milk-room can be a
spring-house with stone-floor, and a little water passing over it, you
will find it a great benefit. The shade, situation of windows, avoiding
a current, &c., should be the same as in the cheese-dairy.
To prevent the taste of turnips or other food of cows in milk and
butter, put one quart of hot water into eight quarts of the milk just
drawn from the cow, and strain it at once. It has been recently
declared, by intelligent farmers, that if you feed the turnips to cows
immediately after milking, the next milking, twelve hours after feeding
the roots, will be free from their taste or odor. The easiest remedy is
the boiling water.