How-To: Make your own butter! (and Buttermilk!)
Trying to get back into the blogging today and I'll start off with this super easy how-to! Making your own butter is way easier than you might think if you've never tried it before. Its one of things you should do at least one in your life!
For me, the hubby and I have been looking for ways to improve our diets. We started buying organic milk and are venturing into whole wheat pastas and using different ingredients like grapeseed oil, flax and even buckwheat flower. We have been buying large quantities of margarine for years now and have recently thought that it is not as healthy as you would think. Margarine and (fake)"butter" are both just highly processed oils and crap. Real butter might be high in fat and what not, but at least your putting something real into your body. Just remember its best to use real butter in moderation.
So how to make it yourself?
We used heavy cream (Hood), but we will not be buying Hood again, we're going to look for a more natural organic cream to use next time.
Regardless of what you use here are the steps....
Time: 20 minutes
Makes: 2 cups of butter
Supplies:
Large Mixing Bowl
Hand held beater
1 Quart cream
spoon
strainer
small bowl
-Pour 1 quart of cream into a large mixing bowl.
-Use a hand held mixer to beat the cream until it thickens
*we tried to put it in a regular blender the first time but it creates air pockets when it gets too thick and doesn't mix well.
-Keep blending for 10 minutes as it continues to thicken
-At the point when it is clearly very very thick, let it sit for a few minutes
-Beat once again for another few minutes and it should all of a sudden start to get a bit thinner but you'll see it start to separate, and beat for another minute or two
-Strain off the liquid (which is Buttermilk!) into a separate bowl, the bits left in the strainer can be places back into the large mixing bowl. Then use a spoon to squeeze out the remaining liquid.
*If you used exactly 1 quart you should have exactly 2 cups of buttermilk strained into the bowl
-As you squeeze out the remaining liquid it'll form a large glob of nice yellow butter
-ta da!
-You can also add a cup of cold water to the butter and strain again to "clean" the butter. This gets rid of any excess buttermilk. The buttermilk and water will not mix back in with the butter so you don't have to worry about accidentally dissolving it or anything like that.
-Package butter into an airtight container and use in moderation. You can add a pinch of salt to the butter if you feel necessary. And you can use the buttermilk to make pancakes!
Trying to get back into the blogging today and I'll start off with this super easy how-to! Making your own butter is way easier than you might think if you've never tried it before. Its one of things you should do at least one in your life!
For me, the hubby and I have been looking for ways to improve our diets. We started buying organic milk and are venturing into whole wheat pastas and using different ingredients like grapeseed oil, flax and even buckwheat flower. We have been buying large quantities of margarine for years now and have recently thought that it is not as healthy as you would think. Margarine and (fake)"butter" are both just highly processed oils and crap. Real butter might be high in fat and what not, but at least your putting something real into your body. Just remember its best to use real butter in moderation.
So how to make it yourself?
We used heavy cream (Hood), but we will not be buying Hood again, we're going to look for a more natural organic cream to use next time.
Regardless of what you use here are the steps....
Time: 20 minutes
Makes: 2 cups of butter
Supplies:
Large Mixing Bowl
Hand held beater
1 Quart cream
spoon
strainer
small bowl
-Pour 1 quart of cream into a large mixing bowl.
-Use a hand held mixer to beat the cream until it thickens
*we tried to put it in a regular blender the first time but it creates air pockets when it gets too thick and doesn't mix well.
-Keep blending for 10 minutes as it continues to thicken
-At the point when it is clearly very very thick, let it sit for a few minutes
-Beat once again for another few minutes and it should all of a sudden start to get a bit thinner but you'll see it start to separate, and beat for another minute or two
-Strain off the liquid (which is Buttermilk!) into a separate bowl, the bits left in the strainer can be places back into the large mixing bowl. Then use a spoon to squeeze out the remaining liquid.
*If you used exactly 1 quart you should have exactly 2 cups of buttermilk strained into the bowl
-As you squeeze out the remaining liquid it'll form a large glob of nice yellow butter
-ta da!
-You can also add a cup of cold water to the butter and strain again to "clean" the butter. This gets rid of any excess buttermilk. The buttermilk and water will not mix back in with the butter so you don't have to worry about accidentally dissolving it or anything like that.
-Package butter into an airtight container and use in moderation. You can add a pinch of salt to the butter if you feel necessary. And you can use the buttermilk to make pancakes!
