Brooklyn Farmhouse Skillshare Recipes: Homemade Butter

Notes from Megan’s ‘Make Your Own Butter & Ricotta’ class for those who were unable to receive a copy! Check our Brooklyn Farmhouse for more info & delicious recipes!

Homemade Butter

Ingredients:
One pint high-quality heavy cream (grass-fed preferrable)
A stand mixer
1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon of kosher salt (optional)

Procedure:
1. Pour the heavy cream into the bowl of the mixer fitted with the paddle attachment.
2. Start the mixer out on low (position 2 on a KitchenAid Mixer) so you don’t spray heavy cream all over yourself.
3. Increase the mixer speed gradually to medium-high (position 6). After 2-3 minutes, the cream will start to thicken to the consistency of sour cream.
4. Keep going, and watch as the cream begins to turn into whipped cream. First, soft peaks (still sort of runny).
5. Then, hard peaks. It will take between 3-5 minutes for the cream to reach this stage.
6. At this point, if you were making whipped cream you’d probably shed a little tear, because the cream is starting to curdle. For our purposes - have no fear - keep going.
7. After another minute or two, you’ll see the cream really start to clump up. Another magical thing you’ll start to notice:
the cream will start to get more yellow in color. Things happen really fast after this.
8. Scrape down the sides of the bowl. You’ll probably have scrape more than once.
9. You’ll start seeing the cream clump even more. Buttermilk will begin to extrude from the mixture and it will become even more butter-yellow. At first, a tiny bit of buttermilk will come out:
10. Then, a huge amount! From one pint of heavy cream, I collected about a cup of buttermilk. Turn the mixer back down to low so you don’t spray buttermilk all over yourself.
11. Keep going on low - more and more buttermilk will be extracted. Stop when you see about a cup of buttermilk in your mixer bowl (you don’t have to measure - just estimate).
12. It’s a little strange - but now you have to wash the butter. This prolongs the butter’s life and actually extracts even more buttermilk. Pour off the buttermilk (you can use it in cooking just like you’d use regular buttermilk) and gather the butter bits together. Under cold running water, squish the butter between your fingers, taking care not to drop any in the sink (you should see additional buttermilk come out).
13. You can put your new butterball back into the mixer and beat in a bit of salt, if you like (this will preserve the butter even longer).
14. Roll up into a tube using a piece of wax paper, parchment, or plastic wrap and refrigerate or use immediately.