As most of you know, we have a cow...
...which is ironic, because I was a vegan for 7 months last year, during the height of Daisy's milk production. I still have mixed feelings about whether or not milk is healthy for us (I know, many of you are gasping and can't believe there is even a school of thought that milk isn't good for you), but because although I tried for 7 months to offer my kids various milk substitutes, I never succeeded in weaning them off cow's milk, so....I gave up.
And because we are currently being supplied with 2 gallons of milk a day, one of which goes to the family of the milker man, I have decided to just embrace dairy, and Daisy, and go back to making ice cream and butter.
When we first bought our cow, before I became a vegan, John bought a pretty nice gallon-sized butter churner
. I liked using it and it made making butter easy. However, when we spent 5 hours in the American Embassy yesterday trying to get the infant's U.S. Citizen Born Abroad Birth Certificate, as I pored through a book I had brought along to entertain myself called Stocking Up: The Third Edition of America's Classic Preserving Guide,
I was introduced to the blender method for making butter.I was inspired, and even though I only had three-quarters cup of cream, I thought I'd give it a go and report to you on it. It was a wild success, and easier to use than my butter churner only because my Vita-Mix is ALWAYS out on the counter. You don't have to have a Vita-Mix, though. You can use any blender, even a food processor if you want. Okay, so here's how you do it...
Ingredients
2 cups of cream, or a third of the capacity of your blender
Salt to taste
Directions
1. Allow your cream to sit out on the counter for about half a day, or until it ripens and thickens a bit.
2. Return it to the fridge until it gets cold again, about 52 degrees F.
3. Pour cream into the blender...
...and blender on the lowest speed until small yellow balls begin to appear, about 5 to 8 minutes.
3 When these balls are about the size of corn kernels, your butter is ready...
4. Over a strainer, pour off the liquid, which is buttermilk, then add enough water to cover the butter and blend it for a few seconds. This rinses the buttermilk out of the butter. Pour off this excess water.
5. Repeat this rinsing process, adding water, blending for a few seconds, then pouring the water off again, until the water runs clear...
You may have to do this several times.
6. Spoon out your butter into a shallow bowl...
...and with a rubber spatula
, press out all of the excess liquid, pouring it off the butter as you do. Do not spread the butter thin, though, or it will become oily. I have never seen that happen, but the book stated this over and over again, so it must be important. 7. When all of the liquid is pressed out, your butter is finished, and is sweet cream, unsalted butter...
8. If you like it salty, add salt to taste by pressing the salt into the butter with the spatula. I love it really salty, and my finished product was delicious on Zucchini Pineapple Macadamia Bread...
The 3/4 cup I churned only yielded about 2 tablespoons, but that's okay. Next time I'll use at least 3 cups of cream, or about a third of what the blender will hold, as per the book's instructions.
There are other fun ways to make butter that I'll be posting about as the summer goes on, so stay tuned, and let me know if you've ever made butter, and how it went. Thanks for listening!
