◦Start out by pouring unpasteurized, whole milk into your clean churn jar. Jersey cows usually make the most cream (which means more butter yield), and in my opinion have the best flavored milk, but for our butter yesterday we used Holstein milk. You dont want to overfill your churn jar, or the milk will splash out when you churn and make a big mess. I fill mine a little more than half way full. Wash your milk jugs and save them for buttermilk later.
◦Cover your milk with a clean cloth before replacing the lid to keep dirt from getting in your milk through the hole in the lid. Then set your milk aside in a warm place until it clabbers. It may clabber within a day in the summer, but if the weather is chilly you will have to sit it beside a fireplace or stove, and it could take 3 days, even then. The way to check and see if the milk has clabbered is to gently roll the churn slighty to the side and see if the milk comes away cleanly from the side of the churn. Basically, it has the consistency of yogurt. You may notice that there are 2 layers, and sometime the top layer doesnt ‘set up’. Thats because its part of the cream that has risen to the top.
◦Once you determine that your milk has clabbered, grab your dash and sit it gently down into the milk, then replace your churn lid.
◦Begin churning the milk. You want to get in a good rhythm. The faster you go, the quicker you make butter, but you also make a bigger mess. My speed is an up-down per second, which isnt that fast, and still makes butter in no time. Make sure you’re going all the way down and coming all the way back up through the milk with your dash or it will take a long time to make butter. Just like exercise, its not about the speed, so much as the form. If you are having alot of splashback, you can use a clean cloth to cover the hole around the dash, just dont wrap it so tightly around the dash that it gets caught and goes into the milk.
◦When you start noticing little specks of butter forming on your dash its time to check and see if the butter is ready to gather. If you have lots of little butter clumps floating in the top, youre ready.
◦Remove your lid, and pull the dash up so that the head of the dash is just beneath the flecks of butter, and stir slowly in a circular motion to gather your butter together.
◦After youve gathered your butter, scoop it out into a clean bowl, then replace the lid on your churn to keep the buttermilk that has been left behind, clean.
◦Take your bowl of butter to the sink, and pat it together, like youre trying to form a ball. The butter will be very soft. What you are doing is releasing the rest of the excess liquid from the butter. Drain it each time you have a small amount of liquid, and keep working it until there is barely any liquid coming out. (You can add ice to begin stiffening up the butter, just pick whatever doesnt melt out when youre done.)
◦After removing most of the liquid from the butter (and removing any ice that youve added), add salt to your taste. Start with a little, add more if needed. Mix well.
◦After you’ve mixed in your salt, put your butter in the refrigerator for about 10 minutes to let it harden a little more.
◦While you are waiting, place your butter mold into a bowl of ice water. This helps the butter to keep its form.
◦When you remove the butter from the fridge, it should feel firm, but you’ll find that if you squeeze it (which you will!) it is still easily workable.
◦Remove the butter mold from the ice water, reassemble it (leaving it wet), and begin working small handfuls of butter into it. Make sure you press the butter as firmly as possible into the mold, this will help reduce bubbles and imperfections in your final product.
◦After filling the mold with butter, and smoothing off the bottom, place the mold upside down onto whatever container you will be storing the butter in/on, and place back in the refrigerator for about 10 more minutes while in the mold to firm.
◦Gently remove the outer, cuplike part of the mold. DO NOT press down on the stamp handle unless you have to, and then only press it very gently, just long enough to get the butter to begin releasing from the mold, or you will mess up your stamp print.
◦Viola! You have beautiful, and tasty butter!
◦After youre finished making butter, use either a funnel, or a dipper that will fit down into your churn, and pour what is left in the churn (buttermilk) into clean jugs (I used the ones the milk came in), and refrigerate.
(photo 1: pouring the milk, photo 2: (left) butter mold (right) churn dash, photo 3: milk with clean cloths under the lid, photo 4: milk sitting by the stove to clabber, photo 5: checking the milk to see that its clabbered, photo 6: churn with dash, photo 7: churn with dash in the milk, photo 8: churn with dash and lid replaced, photo 9: starting to see butter flecks on the dash, photo 10: checking the butter to see if its ready for gathering, photo 11: gathering the butter together, photo 12: the gathered butter, photo 13: putting the butter into a bowl, photo 14: working the liquid out of the butter, photo 15: draining the liquid from the butter, photo 16: ice in the butter to help it begin hardening, photo 17: chilled butter, photo 18: chilling the butter mold, photo 19: pressing the butter into the mold, photo 20: removing the mold after chilling, photo 21: butter: the finished product, photo 22: getting ready to pour the buttermilk into jugs.)
