Anyone who has driven past the Darigold plant on Front Street has noticed the hand-painted murals depicting scenes from early Issaquah history. Perhaps you have stopped to allow tanker trucks of fresh milk to arrive.
Would you be surprised to learn that each year more than 120 million pounds of butter, 20 million pounds of cottage cheese and 20 million pounds of sour cream are produced behind those colorful murals?
DARIGOLD is one of the oldest and largest manufacturing facilities in the community, and in three articles over several issues, we will be exploring the interesting stories behind their impressive ability to produce 160 MILLION POUNDS of high-quality food in their Front Street facility while hardly a soul knows what’s happening inside.
Starting With Butter
Much of the cream produced by Darigold farmer-owners’ pampered cows is delivered to the Issaquah plant in the five to 12 tanker trucks that arrive at the plant each day. Once unloaded, it’s transformed into butter by the Simon Freres butter churn. While Darigold butter has been a source of local pride since 1918, in 2003 Darigold installed the larg- est European vacuum-style churn ever imported to America. The churn can produce more than 50,000 pounds of butter per hour.
Vacuum chambers on butter churns have been popular in Europe for some time, but the dairies in the U.S. have been hesitant to invest in the technology. Darigold is one of the industry innovators, embracing the vacuum technology.
The special action of the Simon Freres butter churn ensures that excess air is removed from the butterfat particles and the moisture is thoroughly emulsified. The resulting butter has a velvety, smooth, spreadable consistency. Baked goods are more consistent and well shaped because of the butter’s excellent distribution characteristics. It also has a higher melting point, so there’s a longer and more stable window of time for the butter to hold that magical state of sauce-like suspension so prized in classical cooking. When cooks make the precious “golden oil” of clarified butter, the compressed milk solids fall evenly and tightly to the bottom, allowing for easy and efficient separation.
The process is not complicated. The cream is first pasteurized and chilled and then fed into a long, screened cylinder with a rotating drum fitted with beaters down the center. The cream is whipped into a foam, which gradually causes the fat particles to shed liquid and cling together. Augers compress these sticky, grainy solids and force out any residual liquid, which is collected and sold as fresh Darigold buttermilk. What remains in the churn is pure, raw butter. It is squeezed through a perforated plate into long, noodle shapes and run through a vacuum chamber. This is where the magic hap- pens. Without going through a vacuum chamber, butter holds an average of 4 to 5 percent air. Vacuuming the butter solids results in a product that is dense, well emulsified and less than 1 percent air.
In the next step, the butter goes through a machine known as the “butter boat” or “butter silo,” where the butter reaches yellow, creamy perfection: solid but not hard, creamy but not melted. Each turn of the paddle forms soft ripples and luscious waves of butter. It’s what dreams are made of. The cows would be so proud.
Finally, the fresh butter is pumped to one of several packaging lines, where it is pressed into the desired shape, from individual pats to 55-pound boxes. The butter is then safely sealed and delivered to your neighborhood restaurant, bakery or grocery store. ❖
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