NUTRITION OF BUTTER RECIPES

Steps:

• Pour the cream into a jar with a clean marble inside. Screw the lid on tightly. Shake the jar continuously for 5 mins (you can take turns shaking with someone else). The movement of the marble acts as a whisk and helps the butter to churn. You can do it without the marble, it just takes longer. At first the cream will thicken to whipped cream, then it will get even thicker. After about 5 mins you will hear sloshing in the jar – give it a few more vigorous shakes, and that’s the butter churned.
• Scrape out the contents into a sieve sitting over a bowl – the liquid that drains out is buttermilk (which can be kept and used for baking or in pancakes), and the fatty solid in the sieve is the butter.
• With clean hands, squeeze the butter between your fingers over the sieve to squeeze out any more buttermilk, while working it into a ball. ‘Wash’ the butter in a bowl of ice-cold water to get rid of any residual buttermilk.
• To make brandy butter, beat the sugar and a small pinch of salt into the butter, then work in the brandy 1 tbsp at a time. Will keep in the fridge for up to one week.

Steps:

• Prepare a screw top jar. It must be clean, dry, and not smell like it's previous contents. (Peanut butter jars work great, as well as baby food jars for smaller portions).
• Pour the cream into the jar, and put the lid on. You will need to leave the jar about half empty to have space to shake, so adjust the amount of cream accordingly.
• Shake the jar vigorously. After a bit, it will coat the sides of the jar, then become whipped cream. Keep shaking - it will start to separate. Its done when it is totally separated into butter and buttermilk.
• NOTE: I stopped every minute to open the jar and take a picture (and let my arm rest :-) ) and it took 7 minutes of shaking. After several reviews, I thought that I'd mention that it takes some people longer - even 20 or 30 minutes - but it is still worth the time to make :D .
• Pour the buttermilk into a separate container, and enjoy!
• A great project for school kids is to use the buttermilk to make biscuits or bread, and then eat it with the butter. While it is very soft at first, it gets rather hard as you store it in the fridge, and will need to soften if you plan to use it as a spread. (If you don't eat it all right away!).
• While researching cheese making I discovered that the resulting butter milk is 'old fashioned' and purchased buttermilk is thicker as it is cultured in a process similar to yogurt. (Someone mentioned this in a review as well.) I have used it with great success in a few recipes without knowing that there was a difference.