Yak butter
As yak butter is called the different butter preparations derived from yak milk are produced. For the production of yak butter, both unhomogenized and unpasteurized as well as boiled yak milk and fermented milk precursors are used.
The fat content of yak milk is higher than that of cow milk . It is therefore particularly suitable for the production of butter and other high-fat products. There are regionally different procedures for butter production. In Nepal the milk is boiled before buttering and acidified with a starter culture, usually in the form of yoghurt . This causes the milk to curdle. The following day, the curdled milk is buttered in a butter churn. When buttering, the butter fat separates from the buttermilk. The washed butter lumps are traditionally kept in sacks made of yak or goatskin.
The Mongolian cuisine also knows a clarified butter that is similar to Indian ghee . This so-called Sar Tos is made from Öröm . With Öröm, similar to the production of clotted cream , the milk is first heated and the cream is skimmed off. For the production of Sar Tos, the cream is collected over a long period of time and fermented in the process. A clarified butter is obtained by melting the Öröm, which is often enjoyed in salted butter tea .
Yak butter is also used in religious ceremonies. It is used, for example, in Buddhist ceremonies as fuel in small lamps and is also one of the ritual offerings. Butter is used in hair care and in making leather from yak hides. Yak butter is also an important commodity for some of the Central Asian peoples. For example, until the border was closed after the annexation of Tibet by China in 1950, there was brisk trade between Nepal and the Buddhist monasteries of Tibet. The Nepalese population who owned yak exchanged yak butter mainly for salt . After the border closed the trade, small cheese dairies were set up with Swiss help in order to be able to process the milk surplus in a meaningful way.
literature
- Jürgen Lensch, Peter Schley, Rong-Chang Zhang (eds.): The Yak (Bos grunniens) in Central Asia (= Eastern European studies at the universities of the State of Hesse. Series 1: Giessener Treatises on Agricultural and Economic Research in Eastern Europe. Vol. 205) . Duncker and Humblot, Berlin 1996, ISBN 3-428-08443-8 .