Homemade Butter

So I can cross something off my 2011 Goal List because I've officially made butter!! I'm glad I did it, but unless we get a cow, I don't think I'll be doing it again anytime soon. All you have to do is shake heavy cream in a jar until it makes buttermilk and butter. Sounds easy, right? Well shaking a big jar for 30 minutes made me motion sick and cranky. Just ask my husband. (Actually I had to do it twice because I didn't have a container big enough for all of the cream so I was EXTRA cranky.) It was pretty cool to watch the whole process though and it would be a fun science activity for kids.

All you need is heavy cream and a container with a lid:

 Then shake shake shake until it makes
butter that clumps together like this:

 Then squeeze the buttermilk out of the butter and separate:

 You could put it in a butter mold to make fun shapes, or you could add honey, cinnamon, herbs, etc to make a specialty butter, or you could just melt it on a biscuit. :)  

Refrigerate so it will harden and enjoy your hard earned butter!

Learning Curve Note: Rinse the butter until ALL the buttermilk is out, otherwise your butter will sour.

Linked at Raising Homemakers