We've been getting our raw milk from a local dairy of pasteured cows for a while now and I've been itching to try something with it other than drinking. This morning Morgan and I were looking for something to do and decided to try it.
We had gotten milk yesterday, so it had settled and separated. The bottles I use are the old fashioned, half gallon type with a narrow opening. I didn't have a great way to get the cream off the top. With a little finagling, I was able to get about 1 cup of cream off the top. We put it in a pint canning jar and started shaking. Morgan got bored pretty quickly, so I sat and shook it for my arm workout for the day.
After about 20 minutes I could see it really getting thick and coating the jar quite well. All of a sudden you could see it forming the butter. The curds had formed and the sides of the glass cleared. There was no mistaking the fact that we had created something here.
I dumped it into a sieve and ran water through it to get the excess buttermilk off. All the while I was kneading it and forming it. We certainly don't have much, but there is potential. I've been wanting to make cheese and now have an excuse to get more milk each week. I can take the cream off the top for butter and use the rest for cheese and drinking. I'm so excited! Another goal reached for my yearly list.
5 comments:
I don't know if the butter churn is up the road at my MIL's or above the barn.... I really need to go through both places....
If you could rock it, like a cradle, have someone build you a form for the jar... it may save you a lot of labour.
My Dh was raised on raw milk, but they had dairy cows at the time, we have beef cows now. I have tried it at friend's... It's one of those "if I had to... I would... but since I don't.. I won't". B/c of eldest's dairy intolerance both boys drink soy milk. They can now tolerate dairy once more but they still prefer the soy. Personally... as long as they drink it... I'll buy it. Dh and I use regular milk but we're not big milk drinkers... but we put cheese on everything. One day I'd like to make my own mozz.
Farmwife, I'm thinking that a rocker for a canning jar would be a good thing.
The kids love the raw milk, although I'm not much of a milk drinker. Cheese on the other hand, I love.
When I taught preschool, we used to put 2 marble in small butter tub and then had the kids shake it in a figure 8 until it make butter, took abot 20 mins.
Good for you, another goal set!
We kept a dairy cow when I was growing up (large family - lots of mouths to feed) and I have good memories of sitting on the front porch of our old farm house taking turns with my sisters at churning the butter. We ate so well despite being rather poor at the time because we had a milk cow (that we bred each year for a calf that provided us with the freezer beef), chickens (meat and eggs), and a huge garden. We even kept a pig now and then and other types of fowl. To this day, i cannot stand anything but whole milk and I adore cream and products made from the same.
P.S. Don't worry about the Cascadia Pea Seeds - it was the Dakota Peas that the birds ate and I had to reseed. I have plenty of Cascadia seeds on hand even if something similar happens to them. Plant em and enjoy em!
Kerry, it was lots of fun.
Kitsap, what a wonderful childhood! I'm sorry you lost so many of your peas. I wish I had some for you.
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