Did you know that you can make butter at home?
I didn’t! which is why this is all sounding all scienc-y – fancy to me. In any case, I am still much wowed by the fact that all you need to churn some homemade butter for yourself is some heavy cream and a large jar.
Also some elbow grease. Mannnn! I have new biceps now!
Ok, kidding. It’s not that hard. You just need to pour in the heavy cream and shake, shake, shake and shake until the cream becomes butter!
At first it will just slosh around in the jar and you will start wondering if it ever happens. And then it will thicken gradually and become whipped cream. At this point, however much you shake you wint feel like the content in the jar aren’t really shaking, but never you mind. put your back into it and shake like there’s no tomorrow.
Eventually you will hear sloshing again and then shake some more. When you open it up, the buttermilk will have separated – a thin, milky, translucent liquid and butter solids. Of course it won’t look like butter then, but don’t worry. It is butter, well and good.
Anyways, this recipe is perfect for people like me who always have a random pack of heavy cream in the fridge but is constantly running out of butter. Yes I am strange like that to have cream and not butter in my fridge. Don’t judge!
- Yield: 1 small jar
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Serving: 1 small jar
Homemade butter
Ingredients
- Heavy cream - 300ml
- Salt - to taste
- Large Glass jar
Instructions
- Put the heavy cream into the jar and shake until the cream separates into buttermilk and milk solids. This will happen in stages and you will have to keep shakin’ it for a good 15 minutes or so.
- Once the cream has separated, drain the buttermilk off. Reserve this for cakes later on because buttermilk in cake – mmmmmm!
- Knead the drained butter solids in very cold water so that you wash the remaining buttermilk off. This is so that the butter will keep for longer. The more thorough you are with the wash, the longer the butter will keep.
- Take out of water and massage in salt, garlic powder, herbs, etc into the butter as you wish to.
- Store in the fridge. Consume within 3 days.
That’s it. That really is it.
And let me just tell you, there is NOTHING better than homemade butter made by yourself.
It’s so creamy and smooth that right after churning it tastes just like ice cream – only saltier. It spreads well and explodes with creaminess in your mouth and turns every boring piece of bread into a luxurious nibble. I strongly recommend you to try it at least once. But remember, good quality fresh heavy cream is the best that you could use.
Tips and tricks
- Some say that adding some pebbles into the jar speeds up the process. But honestly, I can’t be bothered with washing the jar AND the pebbles too.
- Add in whatever flavoring you like. Garlic, herb, sesame seeds or just plain salt – you name it.
- I cannot stress this enough – use good quality cream.