I’ve read over and over how easy it is to make your own butter, but I thought it sounded rather complicated. First you have to somehow get just the cream off the top of the milk, and then there isn’t much there anyway. And after you shake it or blend it, you have to squeeze the buttermilk out and rinse it and compact it.
I thought it all sounded pretty messy and not at all fool-proof, so I’ve been buying raw butter when I can get it.
But yesterday I ran out of the stash I bought a couple weeks ago, and my sources are few and not very convenient. So I decided it was time to try my hand at making my own.
I ran out and bought two half gallon bottles of raw milk and brought them home and set them in the fridge to get nice and cold and separated. Then I took them out and oh-so-carefully poured the cream off the top of each one into my blender.
I set the milk bottles back down and took a look. I thought it looked like there was a bit more cream on top, so I poured out a little more. I wanted to be sure to get enough butter to make this worth my while. I threw in a little salt and put the lid on.
Then I turned on the blender. It’s a small single serve blender, and I soon realized it wasn’t big enough to handle the volume of the cream as it got frothy, so I dumped it into my big stand mixer.
I inserted the wire whip, put a towel around it to prevent splatter, and turned it on. And I left it to do it’s thang.
I’ve whipped cream before. I knew that it would have to whip past the point of whipping cream to get to the butter stage. But when I checked on it after a while, it was just frothy cream. There was no whipping action going on.
I just knew this wasn’t going to be as easy as everyone made it sound.
Frustrated, I replaced the towel and turned it on high and tended to dinner for a few minutes as the mixer whirred.
After a final peek at my delinquent cream, I knew it was a lost cause. I could only assume that in my attempt to get all the available cream, I poured some of the milk in there as well.
I removed the mixing bowl from the machine, and muttered a few choice words about wasting all this valuable cream and what on earth to do with it.
“Just put it back in the milk jug!” my husband, always helpful, called from the next room.
“I dunno,” I said dubiously. That just didn’t seem quite right. I decided to pour it into a pitcher and save it for my coffee.
I used a spoon to scrape out the last remaining bits, and then I curiously licked the spoon. And immediately spat it back into my kitchen sink. I forgot I’d added salt. How glad was I right then that I hadn’t poured it all back into those milk containers!? I’d have ruined $9 worth of milk!
I set the pitcher in the fridge and then took a look. The frothy stuff was almost solid.
Just pretend like you can see what I’m talking about.
“That’s my butter!” I exclaimed. I quickly contemplated how to separate the buttery part from the milky part.
I grabbed a mesh strainer and strained out a few globules of “butter” into the mixing bowl and put the rest of the cream back in the fridge. For what, I have no idea. Certainly not my morning coffee. Salt-laden coffee, anyone?
I turned the mixer on high and let it whirl. After a few minutes, I took a look. And what to my wondering eyes should appear but about a tablespoon of homemade butter sitting in its very own buttermilk in the bottom of my mixing bowl.
Delighted, I did as instructed in various online tutorials and I squeezed out whatever liquid I could and ran it under cold water. I guess I didn’t mix it quite long enough because it was very soft. No matter. We like our butter spreadable, yes?
I grabbed a custard cup and deposited the little dab of butter inside. Excitedly I called my husband and my kids to show them my proud accomplishment.
I just so happened to have a slice of fresh homemade bread sitting on my counter, so you better believe I wasted no time slathering that little dab of butter on top and taking a bite. Or five.
Nectar of the gods, I tell you. The taste was nothing short of that. And it cost about as much too.
I can’t say I’ll be trying this again any time in the near future. At $6 a pound, it’s worth driving to the growers market and letting them do the work. Unless, of course, I can figure out a fool proof way to get just the cream out of my milk bottle.
But it was fun to try it. And at least I don’t have to worry about eating too much!
You might do well to put your milk in a different container with a wider opening so you can skim the cream off better. Pouring it out of those bottles will not work. Maybe try a wide mouth pickle jar that holds a gallon. Let it sit and the cream will rise to the top again (you can put it in the fridge for this step). Then skim just the cream and put it in the mixer. Turn it on high and add your salt before it becomes butter so it won’t be as gritty. It will look worse before it looks better. it has to seize up. When you wash it, use really cold water and squeeze and rinse, squeeze and rinse until the water runs clear (or almost clear).
And it is the yummiest stuff ever, isn’t it?
I LOVED this post. I can just see you in the kitchen with cream a flyin’(sorry…my vision)! We used to do this when we lived in India but I hated the milk and the butter. We also made our own cottage cheese but GAG! Then again it was Water Buffalo milk and they eat garbage…*shudder*
Wow – I’m impressed that you gave this a try! It was fun to hear about your experience, and I feel very glad to have recently stocked up on butter.
Have a good day!
Here is Heavenly Homemaker’s tutorial on making butter, if you hadn’t seen it: http://heavenlyhomemakers.com/blog/how-to-make-fresh-butter
She fascinates me. All the making everything from scratch.
Thanks for sharing your accomplishments and your not-so-good tries!
Jo-Lynne – Did you mean this to be so funny? Because I am sitting here at work trying to pick myself up off the floor.
This post surely deserves some witty retort, but I just can’t think of anything worthy
Wow!! And now she makes her on butter! You are amazing!
This is so impressive!! And hilarious at the same time. Glad you enjoyed those few bites of homemade bread and butter!
Our local dairy recommends putting the milk in an ice tea jar with a spigot. Milk comes out the bottom, and you can take the cream off of the top. I’ve never attempted to make butter though. Hope this helps.
Very cool! I am glad you at least tried to make it, so you can in a pinch again.
Thank you for sharing your experience. Now I really appreciate buying butter ready made!
Funny story! My 4 year old just made butter at pre-school. Somehow, I don’t see the teachers going through all that trouble with a bunch of 4 year olds. LOL
Do you have one of the old Tupperware shakers? (the ones you might make salad dressing in) Just put the cream in there and let the kids take turns shaking.
When I worked a colonial house as a teenager we let the school kids who came on field trips pass it around and take turns shaking while they listened to their lesson … then served them corn muffins with their own butter.
I love it! What a wonderful “saga”… your hubby sounds like mine – the wise wisdom echoing from the other room, hehe.
Good for you for attempting the difficult. Hey, we gotta try everything at LEAST once, right?
*lifts her salt-free coffee in salut*
Lindsey
I had the same experience with a faillure to make butter one Thanksgiving at my parents’ house. My mother (who grew up on a farm) said that you have to let the cream come to room temp. The next time I tried it, I left it out on the counter for a while. Worked like a charm!
Jo-Lynne! You poor thing. You’re cracking me up, and I should be writing my own doggone posts.
Did you seriously get only 1 Tbs of butter from the whole batch of cream? Yikes! Maybe you can use the salted buttermilk/cream for pancakes or biscuits and guess at how much to decrease the salt in the recipe. If you ever try this again, add the salt just to the butter at the end!
Bringing the cream to room temp will seriously decrease the time whipping/mixing.
I had a very different experience with butter-making in the winter (64 degree house) and the summer. My escapades here: http://www.kitchenstewardship.com/cultured-butter-and-warm-weather-updates/ and you can click through to the how-to post, with lots of photos!
Finally getting to comment on this! I love your post title! Congrats on your accomplishment! It is delish, no?! I’ve always thought it would be a pain to skim the cream myself and thankfully I’m able to buy quarts of cream from the same farm that delivers our raw milk. At $8/quart, it’s pricy and I still have to rely on store bought butter but i make some myself. It is the best. butter. ever. I LOL’ed about the salt…probably a good idea to add that AFTER you drain the buttermilk off, LOL! I did a butter tutorial recently also (http://bit.ly/4EzW6N).
Now, however, you can say that you made homemade butter. I don’t know very many people that can say that. You’re somethin’ special.