I Can't Believe I Made BUTTER!

I can't believe I made butter. I made real butter. Real homemade butter came out of my kitchen!  Sorry for all the excitement...but...I really made butter!  Butter is awesome. Put butter on anything and it will make your problems go away, well not really but it sure will cherish your soul.  Since this is real butter (sorry I had to say that again), you could use this for any recipe that calls for butter, but for the butter purists, I recommend that you slather this on french toast, waffles, pancakes or simply toast.  You could use this to make roasted garlic compound butter too!  

Here is how to make butter...

Not much of a line up but here they are: 

1 pint heavy cream (2 Cups) - COLD

+

Kosher salt 

(if you like salted butter)

Start slow then increase the speed to high

After 3 minutes, you will get a gorgeous whipped cream that is fit for topping your favorite dessert or coffee. But we're not after gorgeous, we're after butter. You'll see what I mean...

5 minutes

7 minutes

Scrape the bowl down and resume again...

8 minutes

As you can see, the beautiful whipped cream is breaking down and slowly withering away

Scrape the bowl and resume again. You will have to reduce the speed because now the liquid is separating from the solids. If you keep it on high speed, the liquid will fly around in your kitchen...Not like I know that from experience or anything.

This is the result after 9 minutes. Maybe it was 10 minutes? Not sure but you get the idea.

The fat solids are contained and holding on for dear life in the wire whisk. The liquid has been left behind and will be cast away forever.

  

Put the solids in a sieve that is placed over a bowl. There will still be additional moisture that will need to be squeezed out. Make sure the sieve is placed high enough in the bowl so that it doesn't touch the bottom of the bowl.

 

Since I like salted butter, I added 1/2 tsp kosher salt and folded it in to the butter while still in the sieve and continued to squeeze the excess moisture. If you don't like salted butter then you can skip this step.

2 Cups of heavy cream will yield approximately 6 ounces of butter which is equivalent to 1 1/2 sticks of butter. 

1 stick of butter is 4oz. 

I reshaped it to look like a stick of butter (well I didn't do a really good job but I'm sure you can appreciate the effort). I put the store bought stuff in the background to give you an idea.

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Butter

2 Cups Heavy Cream

1/2 tsp Kosher salt (if you want salted butter)

Put the butter in your stand mixer or if you have a hand mixer you could use that too (although it will be messy).  Start the speed on slow and slowly increase the speed to high. After about 3 minutes you will notice a lovely whipped cream that can be used for whipped toppings for your favorite dessert. Since we are after butter, the process is far from over. Keep whipping and you will notice the solids begin to break down and the liquid separating from the solids. This entire process took me 9-10 minutes. Place the butter solids in a sieve that is placed over a bowl. Make sure the sieve isn't touching the bottom of the bowl. Squeeze out the excess moisture, as much as you can. Since I like salted butter, I used 1/2 tsp kosher salt. If you like unsalted butter, you can skip this step. Reshape to look like a stick of butter if you like and enjoy. For the butter purists, enjoy this on french toast, waffles, pancakes or simply toast.  You could use this to make roasted garlic compound butter too!

FYI...here is what the liquid looked like and here is how much was left behind.