Butter https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/t13005 Runboard| Butter en-us Fri, 29 Mar 2024 14:00:48 +0000 Fri, 29 Mar 2024 14:00:48 +0000 https://www.runboard.com/ rssfeeds_managingeditor@runboard.com (Runboard.com RSS feeds managing editor) rssfeeds_webmaster@runboard.com (Runboard.com RSS feeds webmaster) akBBS 60 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241920,from=rss#post241920https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241920,from=rss#post241920Firle, amazingly, I am hardly sore at all. A little stiff in my right shoulder (I used my right arm/hand the whole 2 hours), but I also have arthritis in my shoulders and it's really rainy today, so....I'm surprised I'm not really sore or in more than usual pain. Maybe the churning helped lube my shoulder joint some....they say the key to staying mobile with arthritis is to be as mobile as possible, even on the days you hurt. DH does love his buttermilk, but not sure he can drink this much before it goes bad. I may actually see if I can wrangle any more butter out of some of it, but using my blender and doing it in small amounts. I have enough I could actually attempt another go with the churn, but prefer to see if it will even work before I go to that extreme. Any butter I may get will have a much lower milk fat, but it may still be OK. An experiment for later this week, perhaps. Texas...it was a lot of work, but well worth every minute. I've always wanted to at least attempt to make butter this way, and you inspired me to stop procrastinating and just jump in. So...thank you! And if I were starting out with a regular churn, I'd start with a gallon of milk, if the churn you plan to use is about the size of mine. Less if it's one of the hand crank type (one that you crank like a jack-in-the-box), as they are considerably smaller. I noticed it didn't take a great deal of salt to get that much butter to my taste. In that huge mound, I only put 1/2 teaspoon, and it was just enough. I tasted the butter before the salt, and I was amazed that just that small amount could work to make it taste just how I like my butter. So...very little sodium. nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Sun, 19 Feb 2012 18:14:23 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241914,from=rss#post241914https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241914,from=rss#post241914  I really want to try it the hand churned way...maybe with less cream as you said. What a lot of work! nondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Sun, 19 Feb 2012 13:23:52 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241909,from=rss#post241909https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241909,from=rss#post241909Hurrah! Wow, that was quite an effort! Two hours of churning, my goodness! I hope you can move your arms today.   I hope your DH likes buttermilk enough to drink it all. Of course, now you have all that wonderful butter to eat, yumm! What better way than to have fresh cornbread with it. I'm very impressed with your experiement and determination. Wow!    nondisclosed_email@example.com (Firlefanz)Sun, 19 Feb 2012 07:06:36 +0000 Re: WE HAVE BUTTER!!!!!!https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241904,from=rss#post241904https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241904,from=rss#post241904Oh my what a day I've had. Churning 2 gallons of cream took me 3 minutes shy of 2 hours and rendered me approximately 3-4 pounds of butter. It took me about another 1-1.5 hours to press the 'buttermilk' out, work the butter, rinse and salt it. For the mound of butter I ended up with, it only took 1/2 teaspoon of salt to be perfect for me. I ended up with almost 3 gallons of 'buttermilk', so I'm thinking I probably could have churned about another 30 minutes and gotten even more butter. I may try to make more butter, using some of the pressed out milk, and the blender for no more than I'll try to begin with. My next batch with fresh cream will be only a gallon of cream. Currently, I have a pan of cornbread in the oven so we can try the butter out. I will start a new thread with the photos and steps so that it won't make this one so long....and we can delete this one if we need/want to. Ok...belly full of hot cornbread topped with homemade butter! YUMMMMMM (need a drooling emoticon...lol). I'll post my butter in 'Food and Health' where Texas' post about her butter is.....where I should have posted this to begin with....anyway.....headed there now to post. I hope the photos work right. I forgot to downsize them before uploading them to Photobucket, so hopefully they resized when I put them in there.nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Sun, 19 Feb 2012 02:15:02 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241807,from=rss#post241807https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241807,from=rss#post241807Texas....I know me...yours was probably faster!!! They say if you use a slow rhythm, it can take up to an hour....but nothing says how many 'thrusts' per minute it'll take to get it done in 30 minutes. When you think of how fast beaters or a whisk on a mixer rotates at even the lowest speed, that's still pretty fast so....yeah, it's gonna be interesting (at least that's one way to put it! )nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Wed, 15 Feb 2012 01:47:04 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241777,from=rss#post241777https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241777,from=rss#post241777I'm excited to see how the butter churn turns out. Mine took 30 minutes anyway, so it's not like it was faster...just easier on the arms! nondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Tue, 14 Feb 2012 15:06:37 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241759,from=rss#post241759https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241759,from=rss#post241759             YAY TEXAS!!!! My turn now. As I posted in your butter thread....I will be getting my cream on Friday. All the arrangements have been made for Colin to pick it up for me on Thursday, then I'll go to his farm on Friday and get it from him. I will either attempt the churning on Saturday or Sunday of this weekend. Just really hope I can manage, because this is going to take a LOT of arm/shoulder power!!!! This will be pure cream....2 gallons of it!!! $13/gal...so I'd better not screw this up! LOL. I will also take photos along the way (hopefully at each milestone) and post them with the end results (taste, consistency, etc). I think it's pretty neat that we'll have 2 different ways of making butter posted here, so people who may be interested in making their own, can see the pros and cons of the methods we're using. And can see photos of each method, so they can kind of use that as a 'map' of sorts. I guess I need to settle on a definite recipe from the ones I've found so far, and keep fingers crossed that mine turns out as well as yours did! lolnondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Mon, 13 Feb 2012 20:43:39 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241752,from=rss#post241752https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241752,from=rss#post241752Hurrah! *runs off to read it*nondisclosed_email@example.com (Firlefanz)Mon, 13 Feb 2012 08:59:00 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241749,from=rss#post241749https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241749,from=rss#post241749I did it, I did it!!!   I made a new post in the Food forum since I took a bunch of pictures for an instructional type thing. It turned out great! Homemade Butternondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Sun, 12 Feb 2012 20:51:48 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241741,from=rss#post241741https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241741,from=rss#post241741Hope all goes well and your butter turns out better this time!!!! (we need a crossed finger emoticon!! lol)nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Sat, 11 Feb 2012 21:03:45 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241726,from=rss#post241726https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241726,from=rss#post241726I made goat butter using the cultured jar method before. It was gross! I'm going to use the cow milk for sweet butter, probably with a jar...we don't own a blender! I'm just today decanting the milk into another container for sitting. Should be able to skim tonight and hopefully make it. We'll see!nondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Sat, 11 Feb 2012 14:01:59 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241716,from=rss#post241716https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241716,from=rss#post241716We had thought about one of the vacuum sealers as well. Partially because there are times when we butcher our own fresh meat. One time, he got a deer, got it signed in, but the place we take our deer too was so packed they couldn't take any more deer to be processed, so DH had to bring it home and we did it ourselves. That's a lot of friggin work!!!!! As soon as he'd get a shoulder, he'd bring it in and I'd put it in ice water to sit for about an hour, empty that water, drain the meat good, then just run cold water with a bit of salt and let it sit till he brought the next piece of meat in...then do it all over again. Most of it we ended up turning into ground meat because it was just a lot easier to package that way. A quart bag will hold about a pound of ground meat. A gallon bag will hold a decent sized roast. Beyond that...there's no other bags. So, a vacuum sealer would be nice..custom sized bags!! Would really come in handy for the butter, too...IF I ever get to make some! Have you made butter before? I can't remember if you've ever said. You'll have to let us know how it turns out. Are you going to use a blender or a jar...or what? nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Sat, 11 Feb 2012 05:23:43 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241690,from=rss#post241690https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241690,from=rss#post241690We get our second gallon of raw milk from the farm tomorrow. I'm going to pour off half of it into a wide mouth container so we can skim the cream off. Should be making butter this weekend! I really really want on of those vacuum sealers for the freezer. We got a "frost free" model because we couldn't find a manual defrost. It causes bad freezer burn after about 3 months. I really want to store things for 6 months so I hope the vacuum sealer will give me that extra life.nondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Thu, 09 Feb 2012 15:56:10 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241683,from=rss#post241683https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241683,from=rss#post241683Texas, I had actually thought about doing that. I have a blender, and it would probably take a lot less time. If I do end up doing the larger batch, I'll divide the cost of butter by how many cakes I get. Depending on the weight of the cakes (like if I do a 1 pound cake...that would equal 4 sticks of store bought) then I can check the prices of store bought butter against the price of the cream to see if I'd be saving anything in the long run. And, home churned butter can be frozen, so if I have a larger batch than I realize...I can freeze a good bit of it and it will be OK. For freezing, I may look into the Ziplock bags that you use the vacuum to pull the air out of to prevent freezer burn, to help keep ice crystals and such off the butter. Still not heard back from the Cruze Farm in Knoxville on pricing.nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Thu, 09 Feb 2012 06:32:14 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241673,from=rss#post241673https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241673,from=rss#post241673Oh fun! If the large quantity is too expensive, do give it a shot with a smaller quantity with another method (shaking a jar, blender, whatever). You might find that the butter is so good, the price for that much cream won't seem so bad!   nondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Wed, 08 Feb 2012 02:26:57 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241664,from=rss#post241664https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241664,from=rss#post241664I've not talked to the guy from the farm here in town yet...I'll wait to see what the price is for what I need before I call him. No point in asking him if he'd be willing to pick it up if I can't afford it. But yes...at least I'm getting some information...which is a good thing...and who knows.....maybe in a couple of weeks, I'll have what I need to make butter!!!! nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Tue, 07 Feb 2012 20:39:08 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241661,from=rss#post241661https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241661,from=rss#post241661Wow, it's great to know someone is actually selling this, and you even have a way of having it brought to you. Things are going well! nondisclosed_email@example.com (Firlefanz)Tue, 07 Feb 2012 18:56:58 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241660,from=rss#post241660https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241660,from=rss#post241660I heard from the farm in Knoxville today, and they do sell cream to individuals, and there is a farmer here in my town that goes down to this farm every week to pick up fresh milk for his farm store and the lady who e-mailed me said this guy may be willing to pick up the cream for me if I didn't want to make the trip down. She gave me his number. I had to figure out about how much cream I would need to fill the butter crock from 1/4 to 1/2 full (all suggestions I've found state I need at least enough for a quarter) so took my 4cup measuring cup, and 1/4 is about 13 cups, 1/2 is about 26 cups, so I could probably do ok with between 1.5 and 2 gallons of cream. She had not quoted me a price, so not sure if I'll be able to do this or not.....really depends on how much they charge for the cream. Will keep you updates as this unfolds.nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Tue, 07 Feb 2012 17:48:47 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241545,from=rss#post241545https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241545,from=rss#post241545I actually got a letter back from the state Ag Dept. The guy who wrote said that in the state of TN, dairies who sell to consumers HAVE to pasturize their products, and there are only 2 dairies in the state that he listed that are complaint for what I need. One is in Knoxville, which is about an hour and a half away from us. They have a website, so I pulled it up and sent them an e-mail telling them what I am looking for, and asked for pricing and what amounts they sell their cream in. So, hopefully I'll hear back from them soon. At least I'm finally getting somewhere!! The guy did say that a lot of people just purchase Half&Half to make butter, and I explained that this is more or less a homesteading type experiment, and that I want it to be as close to how a true homesteader would do it...and that if I were going to go to the store to buy Half&Half, I may as well just by the butter there. So.....we'll see where this goes from here! nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Wed, 01 Feb 2012 05:10:58 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241510,from=rss#post241510https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241510,from=rss#post241510Interesting! I sent a letter to the TN state Ag office to see if maybe they can help me find someone locally to get cream from. Not heard back yet.....so, we'll see. and both of you can have the milk...raw or otherwise! LOLnondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:50:32 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241483,from=rss#post241483https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241483,from=rss#post241483That's what always happened when we got raw milk straight from the farmer. We never made butter, though, instead, we stirred it under. There was often half an inch of cream on top of a liter of milk.    nondisclosed_email@example.com (Firlefanz)Mon, 30 Jan 2012 16:13:28 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241474,from=rss#post241474https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241474,from=rss#post241474Saijen SilverWolf1 wrote: WOW.....so, the line in the gallon jug is where milk and cream separate? All of that above is cream????? If so, I'm JEALOUS!!! Yep, that's called the 'cream line'. Any non-homogenized milk will have the cream rise to the top. It's just that goat milk is called naturally homogenized so only a teeny bit rises even though the fat content is about the same as cow milk. The cream you skim is not as 'pure' as the cream you buy at the store. There's sill plenty of milk trapped inside that cream (so my milk isn't 30% cream!) but it's good enough to make butter. I'll just be sure to keep the buttermilk from this for making pancakes and things since it will be so high quality. We need to move the milk into another container to get the cream off. Hubby doesn't want me to skim it though! He says maybe next gallon we get, but he wants this stuff unadulterated! We just finished our grocery store milk last night so we still haven't tried this stuff yet...can't wait! nondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Mon, 30 Jan 2012 14:48:28 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241467,from=rss#post241467https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241467,from=rss#post241467WOW.....so, the line in the gallon jug is where milk and cream separate? All of that above is cream????? If so, I'm JEALOUS!!! Have fun making your butter. I've not made any other attempts to find some cream. Having not felt all that great last week, didn't feel up to tackling the job. So, I may try working on that this week. It'll be neat, once I find what I need, for us to compare notes on our butter. nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Sun, 29 Jan 2012 21:53:39 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241455,from=rss#post241455https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241455,from=rss#post241455Woohooo! Good luck with the butter!    nondisclosed_email@example.com (Firlefanz)Sun, 29 Jan 2012 11:04:31 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241452,from=rss#post241452https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241452,from=rss#post241452Looks like I may not need to buy my cream separately! I forget how much the cream comes out of cow milk. On the right is the gallon of raw milk was got yesterday. On the left is goat milk - no cream line! nondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Sat, 28 Jan 2012 21:02:41 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241414,from=rss#post241414https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241414,from=rss#post241414I never did hear back from the farm I e-mailed, so guess I need to look for another place to ask. I had thought about going to the local AG office to see if they know of anyone in the area, or asking at the Farmer's Co-Op. I may get better ideas from those 2 places than I will from the internet or phone book!! It bothers me, really, that the people never bothered to e-mail me back. I got an auto reply that said they'd try to respond to my inquiry within 24 hours....that was a day or two after I sent my initial e-mail...so, over a week ago. I don't care for milk, unless I'm eating something really rich, or unless it's chocolate milk and I reallllly don't like raw milk. I never cared for milk, even as a kid, even though I was made to drink it. I just don't like the taste. I've tried raw milk on 2 seperate ocassions...once as a child, and once as an adult...and couldn't stomach it either time. So...y'all can have all of that you want....LOLnondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Thu, 26 Jan 2012 10:02:49 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241392,from=rss#post241392https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241392,from=rss#post241392Raw cow milk is yummy! That's what I grew up on. We got it from a farmer in our village, actually we went there and brought it home in a milk can. (Small one, I think it held 1.5 or two liters.) We usually had to stir in the cream before drinking any. Of course, being kids, we added chocolate powder, or banana or strawberry powder. Eeek, now I would have it pure. With one exception: There was one pasture where wild onions grew. We avoided the milk when the cows were grazing there. It was long ago sold for houses, though, and the farmer is retired and no longer has cows. Sad, really.nondisclosed_email@example.com (Firlefanz)Wed, 25 Jan 2012 16:03:21 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241389,from=rss#post241389https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241389,from=rss#post241389Darn! I checked with the local raw cow dairy in the area (actually, there are several, but only one I know of is easy to get here in Austin). They do have cream listed on their website and the price of it would make the price of the butter (1 quart makes almost 1 lb) just a teensy bit more expensive than the national brand of organic pasture fed butter we currently buy. BUT....the horrible drought has made the butterfat of the cows go down and he isn't selling it right now! On the other hand, it finally encouraged me to put in an order for raw cow milk. We get our first gallon on Friday! A woman 3 houses down from me picks up for our neighborhood so it will be super easy. Believe it or not, I've not had raw cow milk - just goat! Can't wait!nondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Wed, 25 Jan 2012 14:12:46 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241381,from=rss#post241381https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241381,from=rss#post241381I was just wondering how you were fairing in the search for cream! I'm paying more and more attention to local products and I realize we should be better about butter. Hubby hates the local stuff (the cultured one I talked about) and we don't have the cream separator for the goat butter. But I want to make it work somehow! I might have to buy some local cream too...I'll see what price it would be to make my own from the expensive stuff at the local dairy! Any luck?nondisclosed_email@example.com (TexasMadness)Tue, 24 Jan 2012 16:43:04 +0000 Re: Butterhttps://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241196,from=rss#post241196https://bthepaganporch.runboard.com/p241196,from=rss#post241196TexasMadness wrote:  Saijen, I hope you hear back from that dairy. Apparently, you can make butter from cream at the store as long as it's not "ultra pasteurized". I've only ever seen one brand of cream that wasn't though - and it was from a local place anyway! I haven't tried with store-bought stuff. Oh, and we did the blender method at the cheese making class I took. Also just a simple "shake the jar". I agree - the antique butter churn sounds like fun...plus you get some exercise to help offset the calories in your new delicious butter! I hope I do, too. I've not checked e-mails yet today. Yeah, you can use the store bought stuff, but I really prefer it to be totally fresh, and a bit more organic. At least I'll know what the cow has eaten, and the region it grew up in. And yeah....gonna have to offset those calories somehow! LOL....and who knows...it may help me get rid of my 'old lady wings'!!! nondisclosed_email@example.com (Saijen SilverWolf1)Tue, 17 Jan 2012 21:28:51 +0000