Posted in Homestead Kitchen

There aren’t many things that taste better in this world then warm, soft bread fresh from the oven slathered with freshly churned butter.    Churning your own butter is very easy.  Buy the richest, heaviest cream you can find.  I once had a neighbor with a “family cow” and she would give me fresh milk and cream in exchange for my fresh eggs.  If you are so blessed to have a source of fresh cream, all the better.  But, store bought will do.  Be very sure you don’t buy the pre-sweetened cream, the kind they sell for whipped cream.

     For a small batch of butter, start with 2 cups cream.  Let it come to room temperature.  There are a number of ways to churn the butter.  You can use an electric mixer, a blender or do it by hand.  To use the mixer or blender, simply start whipping the cream on a medium speed as if you are making whipped cream.  But, keep going until the butter “breaks”.  This is the point at which the whipped cream separates into the fat (the butter) and buttermilk.  It’s easy to tell when you have reached this point because the butter gets very sloshy and wet, instead of whipped.

     To do it by hand, pour the cream into a clean, quart sized canning jar.  Put the lid on.  Now just shake and shake that jar until the cream whips and finally breaks.  This is a fun project for kids.

     Once your cream has separated, pour off as much of the buttermilk as you can.  Save it for some delicious pancakes or biscuits later. Now you are going to “wash” the butter.  Fill the quart jar or bowl with very cold water, shake it a little and then pour it off.  Do this again and again until the water pours off clear.

     You will need the butter in a cold bowl for this next step, so if you used the canning jar, you’ll need to put the butter in a bowl now.  Using a wide wooden spoon, tip the bowl slightly and start to press down the butter so that the excess liquid is squeezed out of it.  Let that liquid run off to the other end of the bowl and dump it out.  Pick up the whole pat of butter with the spoon, flip it over to the other side of the bowl and do the same thing again.  Do this until you have squeezed most of the liquid out of the butter.  This is very important, because if you leave much liquid in the butter, it will taste sour.

     Now you should have fresh, sweet butter.  You can go ahead and use it just the way it is, or as about ½ tsp. of salt for salted butter.  Use generously on freshly baked bread.  Yum!

Lisa Vitello

Lisa lives on two acres in the Pacific Northwest with her husband, Guy and six children.  She is the publisher of New Harvest Homestead, a bi-monthly newsletter for Christian women who love the homestead life.  Visit her website for a free issue:  www.newharvesthomestead.com.  Be sure and stop by Lisa’s blog here and say hello!