Making butter

Ever since we started milking Maggie, I was looking forward to trying one of our more cherished acquisitions: A butter churn.

This marvelous contraption has been parked on top of our hoosier for about two years, ready and waiting.

This butter churn is pricey – somewhere on the order of $200 – and as far as I know, it's only available at Lehman's (which I believe manufactures it). I've been coveting this churn for a long time. About two years ago, I proposed to swap some writing for it, and the swap was accepted.

And then there it sat: Waiting, waiting, waiting...

At last I had the opportunity to try it. I had saved up a bit under a gallon of cream, then let it sit on the kitchen counter overnight to "ripen." (This is the second of two half-gallon jars; I didn't think to photograph both jars together until too late.)

I churned the butter in two batches, since the gallon jar of the churn isn't supposed to be more than about half-full (to give everything room to expand).

The handle of this churn turns easily. I timed it: It takes 12 minutes to churn the cream into butter.

I poured and scooped everything into a cloth-lined colander.

Then it's time for the most tedious and time-consuming step: Washing the butter, which gets rid of the buttermilk. (Yes, buttermilk can be saved for other purposes, but I didn't do that this time. Keep in mind fresh buttermilk is different than the cultured buttermilk available commercially. It's very thin and milk-like, rather than thick.) At this stage, the butter is very loosey-goosey, and since it's hydrophobic, it's a matter of endlessly filling a bowl with cold water, squishing the butter around, then pouring off the water/buttermilk combo. Rinse and repeat, literally. Again and again and again.

Can you see the cloudiness of the liquid? That's buttermilk still coming out of the butter, making the water look white.

This is the point where I use another Lehman's tool, one I purchased on my first visit to the store: A curved butter paddle. This is an aid for pressing buttermilk out of butter. It's been sitting in our hoosier for ten years, waiting its turn. Now at least I could put it to use. (It works great!)

Washing butter takes about 30 or 40 rinses until the water runs clear. After that, it's a matter of squishing the butter to extract any remaining water.

From this batch, starting with about 1.75 quarts of cream, I got about 2.25 lbs. of butter.

By some suggestions, butter should be left out for another few hours, then worked again to pull out any remaining water. I covered the butter with a plastic bowl cover during this time.

Then it was time to wash up.

The next morning, I pressed the butter one last time to extract any remaining water, then added salt. I kept forgetting how much salt to add, so I finally wrote it on a tiny piece of tape and stuck it on the kitchen window frame: 3/8 teaspoon per pound.

For what I don't put in the fridge for immediate use, I freeze. For freezing, I plop about half a pound of butter onto some waxed paper, wrap it, and slip that into a plastic bag, which I then tuck into the freezer.

All spare cream is going into butter at this point. (I'm not making cheese yet; I still need a cheese press!) Homemade butter is delicious and easy. I'll make all I can – while I can.