The Story of Polson Butter

Date

July 26, 2007

Post by

arZan

It is a quirk of technology that occasionally, instead of advancing as usual, it gets stuck at a certain stage. The QWERTY keyboard is the best example, a layout of letters that made sense for a long forgotten typewriter design, but which has persisted because too many keyboard users are too used to it to change.

Something similar seems to have affected Indian butter, because it’s hard to explain why else it tastes the way it does. It is so strongly flavoured and salty that it can be distinct shock to those unused to it.

It is certainly tasty, but it is nothing like the best farmhouse butters of France or Ireland which combine the rich mouthfeel of butterfat with an underlying fresh creamy milkiness and subtle grassy notes from the pastures where the cows have eaten. ”

Coagulated sunlight,” the Irish poet Seamus Heaney describes it, “heaped up like gilded gravel in the bowl.” Harold McGee, the food scientist, notes that these lines are an accurate description of what happens: sunlight makes grass; cows eat it and convert it into fat that is dispersed as microscopic globules in their milk; after milking, these globules are firstly gently separated out as cream, and then less gently churned to smash them together into the large masses of fat that is butter.

The process has long been known in India. Navaneetha is the Sanskrit name for the freshly churned butter which infant Krishna used to steal. Yet problems of storage in a hot climate meant that butter was rarely kept this way. Even after churning butter contains water and milk solids which can turn it rancid, unless it is clarified, by heating it to boil away the water and precipitate the solids.

This leaves ghee which is almost pure butterfat and has a long storage life, and this is why, barring Krishna’s pilfering, fresh butter itself was historically little used in India, until the British arrived. Coming from a country where melted butter was often the only sauce used they had to have it, and Achaya notes a reference to butter at an afternoon meal made by a Mrs Eliza Fay in Calcutta in 1780. Perhaps a few dairies were making it in Calcutta, or it was made domestically from the ‘top of milk’ malai saved from the milk consumed at home

But large scale butter manufacture in India came about thanks to the army and Bombay. The army felt its battalions needed butter and set up Military Dairy Farms across India, whose surplus butter was sold to civilians. Meanwhile farmers in the Kaira district of what is now Gujarat realised that the growth of the railways meant they could supply milk products to the fast growing city of Bombay.

A few entrepreneurs, then the government as well, set up dairy operations in the area that made and sent butter to Bombay, but the real growth was to come from a dynamic young Parsi named Pestonji Edulji Dalal who in 1888, aged just 13, started a small shop to roast and grind coffee. According to Ruth Heredia’s The Amul India Story, Dalal’s nickname was Polly, which he adapted into the British sounding Polson’s for this brand name.

Polson’s coffee soon got regular customers among the British and by 1910 Pestonji was well established and looking for new opportunities. So when a customer in the Supply Corps told him of the problems the army still had getting butter, he decided to jump in. Pestonji set up a dairy in Kaira and used his army and railways contacts to ensure that Polson’s was so widely supplied that it became synonymous with butter.

By 1930 Polson’s had opened the most advanced dairy plant in India and dominated the butter business. But as Heredia’s book points out, it was this dominance that caused Polson’s downfall, since it provoked a Gandhian called Tribhuvandas Patel to organise the co-operative that would ultimately become Amul.

It was Patel who persuaded a young dairy engineer called Verghese Kurien to join Amul, and the story of how Amul butter got its taste is given in Kurien’s autobiography I Too Had a Dream. “Polson always made butter from stale cream,” Kurien recalls. “Sometimes these cans of cream would be kept for as long as ten days without refrigeration.” Polson’s weren’t bothered since they had found a way to remove bad odours in the manufacturing process, but Amul was determined to make their butter only of fresh cream – milk to cream to butter, all in the same day.

” Yet in the market it bombed, because people felt it tasted flat and flavourless. Kurien discovered that the sour cream Polson’s used, and their heavy salting of the butter to help preserve it further, had given it a distinctive taste to which customers were too accustomed to change.

Amul had to come up with a solution and found it in a chemical additive called diacetyl that gave it the required butter taste. (In fairness to Polson’s, it should be noted that its common in Europe to let cream sour a bit so that lactic acid bacteria naturally create chemicals, including diacetyl, to give it a rounded butter taste).

They also had to increase salt and add colouring to give their white buffalo milk butter the yellowish colour of cow’s butter that people were used to. Kurien wasn’t happy with this, but recognised that some concessions were needed for consumers. Amul’s butter was soon doing better than Polson’s, and ultimately the co-operative would finish off the company. But since we are used to Amul now as we were to Polson’s then, that tangy and salty taste remains with us, long after the company that created it has gone.

Amul does have competitors now though, both domestically made and imported, and it is interesting to see how it compares. I found three readily available in the Mumbai market, from Mother Dairy and Britannia (but both produced by Schreiber Dynamix Dairies in Baramati) and Lurpak imported Danish butter.

The Lurpak is a good mass market European butter, nothing special, but pleasantly creamy and low in salt – according to their pack details, 470 mg sodium per 100 gm butter compared to Amul’s 836 mg. Since most of us are used to eating less salt these days, Lurpak’s taste is a real relief and somewhat mitigates the fact that it is almost four times the cost of Amul.

The Mother Dairy and Britannia butters though seem to be trying to out-Amul Amul: they are really strongly flavoured and saltier, though wisely perhaps, they leave out the details from their packs. Mother Dairy’s flavour attacks you instantly and harshly; this is not a butter I am going to buy again. Britannia’s is more delayed, but leaves acrid after-tastes.

Perhaps it is just my conditioning, but Amul does fare best, the most balanced between Indian and foreign tastes. But Lurpak’s low salt is alluring and perhaps Amul should consider a version, especially since the growth of cold chains and supermarkets means that storage is no longer such an issue. It would surely be ironic if after these years all the old Parsi could yet have some revenge by seeing some Amul customers driven to foreign brands by the persistence of the Polson’s taste.

60 Comments

  1. Satya

    Polson was one of the tastiest butters from 1963, the time I started eating Bread, Butter and Jam. Polson was always fresh, delectable and came in very small butter-paper packs. This is now attempted by “Amul”, in fact packaging wise. However as far as taste is concerned, breakfast time would have be conspicuous by its absence. Polson butter thereafter became a Generic word indicating butter and people used it even as colloquial meaning buttering a person. I have seen it vanished from the Parsi Irani shops since 1972 or may be phased out later after Amul butter, a product of Anand Dairy entered the competition in a big way.Polson was always the king of Butter.

  2. Satya

    Polson was one of the tastiest butters from 1963, the time I started eating Bread, Butter and Jam. Polson was always fresh, delectable and came in very small butter-paper packs. This is now attempted by “Amul”, in fact packaging wise. However as far as taste is concerned, breakfast time would have be conspicuous by its absence. Polson butter thereafter became a Generic word indicating butter and people used it even as colloquial meaning buttering a person. I have seen it vanished from the Parsi Irani shops since 1972 or may be phased out later after Amul butter, a product of Anand Dairy entered the competition in a big way.Polson was always the king of Butter.

  3. Joseph J Rodrigues

    Where can I get this butter now as I am craving to have my early morning toast with this delicious butter applied there are no words to describbe all I can say it left that full feeling in the mouth It was just delicious.

  4. Joseph J Rodrigues

    Where can I get this butter now as I am craving to have my early morning toast with this delicious butter applied there are no words to describbe all I can say it left that full feeling in the mouth It was just delicious.

  5. zantab

    In 1958, I was a small boy. My father used to go on tours to Port Okha in Gujarat, where we would stay at the palatial seafront guest house, with his own cook and office staff. Breakfast would be served with great ceremony and usually included fresh crisp toast with Polson’s butter out of a flat round tin with the name POLSON’s in red block lettering. It was then that I developed my love for buttered toast and for me, since then the pinnacle of butter has always been Polson’s. Even today, I spread my English butter on my English toast, then close my eyes and whisper “Aah, Polson’s!” before taking the first bite! That memory has never faded.

  6. zantab

    In 1958, I was a small boy. My father used to go on tours to Port Okha in Gujarat, where we would stay at the palatial seafront guest house, with his own cook and office staff. Breakfast would be served with great ceremony and usually included fresh crisp toast with Polson’s butter out of a flat round tin with the name POLSON’s in red block lettering. It was then that I developed my love for buttered toast and for me, since then the pinnacle of butter has always been Polson’s. Even today, I spread my English butter on my English toast, then close my eyes and whisper “Aah, Polson’s!” before taking the first bite! That memory has never faded.

  7. Veronica Paul

    Type your comment here…
    There is something about Polson’s butter that defies description. Even now, some 50 years later, it still evokes memories of golden, ‘buttery’ butter which tasted the way butter should taste. ‘Bun-maska’ is just not the same without the original ‘maska’. I do remember the packaging so well, especially the coupons which we as children used to carefully collect.
    Today, I thought of Polson’s butter again and was delighted to find the link on the net. Atleast, the net helps to keep these precious memories alive.

  8. Veronica Paul

    Type your comment here…
    There is something about Polson’s butter that defies description. Even now, some 50 years later, it still evokes memories of golden, ‘buttery’ butter which tasted the way butter should taste. ‘Bun-maska’ is just not the same without the original ‘maska’. I do remember the packaging so well, especially the coupons which we as children used to carefully collect.
    Today, I thought of Polson’s butter again and was delighted to find the link on the net. Atleast, the net helps to keep these precious memories alive.

  9. KAMAL BHATIA

    In 1956, as a kid, going for his primary school,a breakfast of
    pav loaded with polson butter was a daily morning treat. After waking up early morning, i used to get ready very fast, not for going to school, but to get the pav – polson butter treat.
    We also used to collect lots of gift coupans by tearing open
    the thick paper pack and get small gifts from the Irani hotel owners.Wish for the comeback of polson.

  10. KAMAL BHATIA

    In 1956, as a kid, going for his primary school,a breakfast of
    pav loaded with polson butter was a daily morning treat. After waking up early morning, i used to get ready very fast, not for going to school, but to get the pav – polson butter treat.
    We also used to collect lots of gift coupans by tearing open
    the thick paper pack and get small gifts from the Irani hotel owners.Wish for the comeback of polson.

  11. TROZA

    There is no butter that equals POLSON

  12. TROZA

    I still cannotget the flavour of Polson out of my mind! POLSON was amazing! Wish they would bring it back on the market.

  13. TROZA

    There is no butter that equals POLSON

  14. TROZA

    There is no butter that equals POLSON

  15. TROZA

    I still cannotget the flavour of Polson out of my mind! POLSON was amazing! Wish they would bring it back on the market.

  16. TROZA

    I still cannotget the flavour of Polson out of my mind! POLSON was amazing! Wish they would bring it back on the market.

  17. Himanshu

    What can we do to bring back Polson Butter ? 

  18. Himanshu

    What can we do to bring back Polson Butter ? 

  19. Himanshu

    What can we do to bring back Polson Butter ? 

  20. Kerman Gagrat

    GREAT NEWS MY FRIENDS, 

    AAPROO POLSON BUTTER IS BACK & ITS AS GOOD IN TASTE & TEXTURE AS IT WAS BEFORE. JUST EXPERIENCED IT TODAY MORNING. 

  21. Kerman Gagrat

    Good news, Polson butter is back in market. Enjoy it.

  22. Kerman Gagrat

    GREAT NEWS MY FRIENDS, 

    AAPROO POLSON BUTTER IS BACK & ITS AS GOOD IN TASTE & TEXTURE AS IT WAS BEFORE. JUST EXPERIENCED IT TODAY MORNING. 

  23. Kerman Gagrat

    GREAT NEWS MY FRIENDS, 

    AAPROO POLSON BUTTER IS BACK & ITS AS GOOD IN TASTE & TEXTURE AS IT WAS BEFORE. JUST EXPERIENCED IT TODAY MORNING. 

  24. Kerman Gagrat

    Good news, Polson butter is back in market. Enjoy it.

  25. Kerman Gagrat

    Good news, Polson butter is back in market. Enjoy it.

  26. Kerman Gagrat

    GOOD NEWS. POLSON BUTTER IS BACK IN MARKET. Taste & texture is as good as before, Those who have experienced it before will know exactly what I am talking about.

    WELCOME BACK. Parsis will be the most Happiest people as they enjoy the most since their staple breakfsat / food is Bun Maska or Brun Maska & that too only POLSON. 

  27. Kerman Gagrat

    GOOD NEWS. POLSON BUTTER IS BACK IN MARKET. Taste & texture is as good as before, Those who have experienced it before will know exactly what I am talking about.

    WELCOME BACK. Parsis will be the most Happiest people as they enjoy the most since their staple breakfsat / food is Bun Maska or Brun Maska & that too only POLSON. 

  28. Kerman Gagrat

    GOOD NEWS. POLSON BUTTER IS BACK IN MARKET. Taste & texture is as good as before, Those who have experienced it before will know exactly what I am talking about.

    WELCOME BACK. Parsis will be the most Happiest people as they enjoy the most since their staple breakfsat / food is Bun Maska or Brun Maska & that too only POLSON. 

  29. Kerman Gagrat

    GOOD NEWS. POLSON BUTTER IS BACK IN MARKET. Taste & texture is as good as before, Those who have experienced it before will know exactly what I am talking about.

    WELCOME BACK. Parsis will be the most Happiest people as they enjoy the most since their staple breakfsat / food is Bun Maska or Brun Maska & that too only POLSON. 

  30. Jennifer

     Please please please tell us where in India Polsons butter is back.This is one of the best news in this time of so much of poliical upheaval.Do get back to us  with the information for which we would be so butterly happy.Jennifer.

  31. Jennifer

     Please please please tell us where in India Polsons butter is back.This is one of the best news in this time of so much of poliical upheaval.Do get back to us  with the information for which we would be so butterly happy.Jennifer.

  32. Jennifer

     Please please please tell us where in India Polsons butter is back.This is one of the best news in this time of so much of poliical upheaval.Do get back to us  with the information for which we would be so butterly happy.Jennifer.

  33. Maneck

    Yes, it is back in Mumbai but it is not easily available,  can somebody furnish name of Store in Dadar or Andheri, so that we can buy same.  Understand it is available in Clubs and one of them is Willingdon Club, where only members can purchase  Pl do email me on maneck@fakcargo.com
    @fakcargo:disqus Thanks   Maneck

  34. Maneck

    Yes, it is back in Mumbai but it is not easily available,  can somebody furnish name of Store in Dadar or Andheri, so that we can buy same.  Understand it is available in Clubs and one of them is Willingdon Club, where only members can purchase  Pl do email me on maneck@fakcargo.com
    @fakcargo:disqus Thanks   Maneck

  35. Maneck

    Yes, it is back in Mumbai but it is not easily available,  can somebody furnish name of Store in Dadar or Andheri, so that we can buy same.  Understand it is available in Clubs and one of them is Willingdon Club, where only members can purchase  Pl do email me on maneck@fakcargo.com
    @fakcargo:disqus Thanks   Maneck

  36. Manek Mistry

    Great News, but no one know where it is available…..

  37. Manek Mistry

    Great News, but no one know where it is available…..

  38. Manek Mistry

    Great News, but no one know where it is available…..

  39. Snowwhite201114

    hey dear i didnt know tht u could help me out. I hv fed my daughter with Polson Butter. and then now it has closed since many many years. i want to give her again this same butter. can u pls do something and get me this polson butter pls

    try ur best dear

  40. Snowwhite201114

    hey dear i didnt know tht u could help me out. I hv fed my daughter with Polson Butter. and then now it has closed since many many years. i want to give her again this same butter. can u pls do something and get me this polson butter pls

    try ur best dear

  41. Snowwhite201114

    hey dear i didnt know tht u could help me out. I hv fed my daughter with Polson Butter. and then now it has closed since many many years. i want to give her again this same butter. can u pls do something and get me this polson butter pls

    try ur best dear

  42. Priyadarshan

    SOMEONE MENTIONED FARM PRODUCTS AT ELECTRIC HOUSE, BEHIND THE TAJ.

  43. Priyadarshan

    SOMEONE MENTIONED FARM PRODUCTS AT ELECTRIC HOUSE, BEHIND THE TAJ.

  44. Priyadarshan

    SOMEONE MENTIONED FARM PRODUCTS AT ELECTRIC HOUSE, BEHIND THE TAJ.

  45. Sonali

    Where can I buy this butter. Also heard that they have stopped manufacturing it once again. Can someone clarify

  46. Sonali

    Where can I buy this butter. Also heard that they have stopped manufacturing it once again. Can someone clarify

  47. Sonali

    Where can I buy this butter. Also heard that they have stopped manufacturing it once again. Can someone clarify

  48. Albuquerquenelson681

    Please tell me where is Mumbai is Polson Butter noew available.

  49. Albuquerquenelson681

    Please tell me where is Mumbai is Polson Butter noew available.

  50. Albuquerquenelson681

    Please tell me where is Mumbai is Polson Butter noew available.

  51. G.Fernandes

    Kerman Gagrat has been saying POLSON available since last one year, I didnt see any in the stores locally.Kindly be specific where we can acquire this Golden butter if its true.

  52. G.Fernandes

    Kerman Gagrat has been saying POLSON available since last one year, I didnt see any in the stores locally.Kindly be specific where we can acquire this Golden butter if its true.

  53. G.Fernandes

    Kerman Gagrat has been saying POLSON available since last one year, I didnt see any in the stores locally.Kindly be specific where we can acquire this Golden butter if its true.

  54. Ash Nallawalla

    Kerman Gagrat, have you noticed the Polson-deprived people repeatedly asking you where on Earth (in other words, the name of a shop, address, city, country, planet, etc)???

    That link to the modern Polson Limited has no reference to butter but it makes some very unpalatable chemicals that I would not want on my toast.

    Until I left India in 1973, Polson was the only butter to use. Amul butter was white and bland, so not very popular. The linked article explains how modern-day Amul has gone yellow and salty, so it probably tastes like the old Polson.

  55. Ash Nallawalla

    Kerman Gagrat, have you noticed the Polson-deprived people repeatedly asking you where on Earth (in other words, the name of a shop, address, city, country, planet, etc)???

    That link to the modern Polson Limited has no reference to butter but it makes some very unpalatable chemicals that I would not want on my toast.

    Until I left India in 1973, Polson was the only butter to use. Amul butter was white and bland, so not very popular. The linked article explains how modern-day Amul has gone yellow and salty, so it probably tastes like the old Polson.

  56. Ash Nallawalla

    Kerman Gagrat, have you noticed the Polson-deprived people repeatedly asking you where on Earth (in other words, the name of a shop, address, city, country, planet, etc)???

    That link to the modern Polson Limited has no reference to butter but it makes some very unpalatable chemicals that I would not want on my toast.

    Until I left India in 1973, Polson was the only butter to use. Amul butter was white and bland, so not very popular. The linked article explains how modern-day Amul has gone yellow and salty, so it probably tastes like the old Polson.

  57. Devasheesh Dubey

    So I have never heard of Polson or any other milk company except Amul in my early years (the 90s). I was recently watching the cult classic Andaz Apna Apna, and in a police station scene, Salman Khan’s character Prem mentions that Amar (Aamir Khan) is buttering the police inspector to get out scot-free. The exact dialogue is “Sir maska laga raha hai sir, Polson!” I immediately thought what Polson refers to, and it led me here. It’s really surprising how much of daily life nitty-gritties make their way into cinema. The dialogue would have been so understandable back then, now it’s a forgotten history.