How To Make Butter

Here is a tutorial on how to make butter.  Yes, I'm serious! We are going to make real butter and no, you don't need a butter churn.

I know a lot of you are probably asking yourself, "Why in the world would I make my own butter when I could just buy it at the store?"  Well that's one of those questions I love!  My first response is to say "Why not make it myself?"  I have already purchased the milk so the butter comes as a "free" product if I will just make it.  Second, I love to know what I'm eating, where it came from, and how it was prepared.  When I take out the middle man I answer all those question myself.  Plus it is one more thing on my personal list of steps to REAL self sufficiency. 

I started making butter in my Kitchenaid mixer and that worked very well.  My only gripes were how many things I had to wash after making it, and since our real mission is self sufficiency, how would I make it if we had no power or if we were trying to use little or no household energy?  There again, I can hear a lot of you saying "Really?  She's thinking about how she could make butter if she had no power?  You've got to be kidding!"  Honestly that's where this path has led us, and it's so exciting and challenging.  For the fun of it I will show you both ways and let you be the judge as to what is the easier method.

Here we go!

This fresh milk we get from the farm.

Notice how the cream rises to the top?  If I were to shake the milk all the cream would redistribute into the milk and it would taste like nice rich whole milk.

See how it sticks to the side of the rim?  That's because the cream is thick and heavy.

 Here is the Kitchenaid method.

Skim the cream off the top of the milk & put into a mixing bowl.

 Use the whisk attachment and start mixing the cream on speed 2.  When it begins to thicken just a little bit move to speed 3 or 4.  The colder the cream is the longer it takes.  I found this out the hard way.

Notice how the state of the cream is changing.  If you were to turn the speed to medium high and add a little sugar you would have whip cream.

Continue to increase the speed as the cream allows.  If you turn it up and the cream splashes out of the bowl then take it down a notch.  Before long you will start to see little yellow flakes.  This is butter.  Keep mixing and the cream will slowly change from white to yellow and start clumping together.  As this happens the buttermilk will separate from the butter.  The longer you mix it the more buttermilk will be released which is good.

As the butter starts to get firm and clump together it will get caught inside the whisk.  If that happens just take the attachment off and tap it against the bowl and most of it will come out.

From here on the steps are the same whether you use the electric or hand method.