No Half Measures

23 Jul 2020

The first time I made cultured butter, it worked well! I followed this recipe and also this video for tips. It wasn’t quite as tangy as I wanted, because I only let it culture for about 24 hours.

After culturing I refrigerated and then beat it with my mixer, only learning at the end why the recipe recommends covering it with saran wrap.

The only real question was what to do with slightly more than two cups of buttermilk:

I ended up using it instead of milk in my trusty waffle recipe.

The second time, something went very wrong. I let it culture for 3 days hoping for some more tang in the final product.

I whipped and whipped, and the heavy cream just wouldn’t separate. It got to the “frosting” stage and just stayed there. Very little buttermilk came out, and it was clear and watery.

After some frantic Googling, I decided to try separating it in a blender (although I have a Ninja, which is slightly different) and when that didn’t work, adding some hot water. Nothing. Frustrated, we decided to refrigerate it and try later. It made slightly more progress, producing a small amount of buttermilk but not nearly as much as the first time. Eventually I gave up, added some salt and accepted my whipped heavy cream, which is pretty tasty despite everything.

Later, sitting in the porch, I realized - I didn’t refrigerate the cultured cream before beating. Apparently that is really important! Lesson learned. Hopefully I remember it for next time.