Homemade Butter

By TPMay

Ingredients

• 2 cups heavy cream (be sure it doesn’t contain thickeners like carageenan; you just want cream)
• salt to taste (optional; see notes below)

Preparation

Step 1

Take the cream out of the fridge about 30 minutes in advance; you want it at a cool room temperature. Pour the cream into the bowl of a stand mixer (or use a deep bowl and a hand mixer) and begin whipping on high speed. Once you reach whipped cream consistency, keep going …

After about 6 to 8 minutes (more or less; the process takes less time if the cream is a bit warmer), the butter will begin to separate. You’ll see a thin, watery liquid start to accumulate in the bowl, and you’ll have small pea-sized clumps of bright yellow solids. At this point, turn the mixer to low and let the solids clump together.
Into a strainer set over a bowl, dump the contents of the bowl; strain off the buttermilk. (Save, refrigerated, for another use. Like biscuits.) Retain the butter in the strainer. Place the strainer under cold running water and rinse until the water runs through the strainer clear. Shake the strainer to drain off as much water as possible, then gather the butter into your hands and knead like dough to remove more of the water. To make salted butter, sprinkle salt over the butter and knead it in with your hands.
Salting the butter: For 2 cups of cream, add 1/2 teaspoon of salt for a fairly salty butter, or 1/4 tsp. for lightly salted; alternately, leave unsalted. To store: Keeps 2 to 3 weeks in the fridge (if it lasts that long!) or for 6 months in the freezer. Note: I wouldn’t advise baking with this butter; its water content is higher than stick butter.




(makes just over 1 cup of butter; if you want more, simply repeat in batches)