Homemade butter may not naturally spring to mind as a good holiday gift, but I've found that paired with a small jar of jam or honey, it makes a wonderful present that people are thrilled to receive. Making butter is easy, especially if you have a stand mixer. I use the paddle attachment to agitate one pint of cream for approximately 10 minutes, until the whey begins to separate from fat globules (until it looks like this).
Strain the butter, put it into a small bowl and rinse with icy cold water. Using a wooden spoon, work the butter to smooth it and squeeze any remaining water out of the butter. The more moisture you can remove, the better. Pack the butter into a small jar (I used an wide mouth, eight ounce canning jar) and refrigerate. If you want to get fancy, just prior to gifting, sprinkle the top of the butter with flaky sea salt.
12-19-2008 @6:33PM scott said... You're leaving out one of the best benefits to making your own butter - not only does it taste fantastic, but you get buttermilk. Pancakes, biscuits... real buttermilk makes them amazing.
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12-19-2008 @7:25PM Michael J Broderick said... The recipe is too ambiguous. How can you rinse something sitting in a bowl as the instructions say? How can you remove moisture if it's sitting in a bowl? Perhaps rinsing off in a strainer is what is meant.
If you want people to make butter for real, (very cool), you should have a detailed recipe to follow along with pictures. As is, this is more of an article than a useful and fun recipe.
I'm not trying to be a jerk. I was just very pumped when I came across the article and was disappointed because I really couldn't make the butter. It's a great idea, help a guy out dude.
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12-19-2008 @7:59PM Bruce A. Knack said... Give this a try:
Google: youtube make butter
Good Luck!!
Cheers,
Bruce.
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12-19-2008 @8:35PM ktpupp said... When I was a kid, we just put the cream into small jars and shook them up til it made butter! Fun for the kids, kills a lot of time too!
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12-20-2008 @4:07PM Erich said... What kind of cream do you use? Heavy cream, light cream, whipping cream? Do they all work?
Also, Scott, where does the buttermilk result from? Is it what is left after pressing he liquid out of the resulting butter product?
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12-21-2008 @8:33PM Jeremy said... Here's a butter video link for ya.
http://tinyurl.com/8k42q4
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