FLOWER POT KITCHEN: HOMEMADE BUTTER

21 Aug 2016

HOMEMADE BUTTER

I WILL NEVER BUY BUTTER AGAIN...

How fabulous is this, I cannot believe how quick and easy butter is to make, in just 5 minutes you will have your own homemade butter which is much more flavoursome creamy and decadently rich, well that is it for me I will never buy butter again...

The instructions that came with the churn said 10-12 minutes of churning, I thought I had butter after 2 minutes but this being my first time churning I carried on for another minute and then relied on my inexperience at making butter and my experience as a cook to judge the situation, as I thought I was right I had separated the buttermilk from the cream leaving butter in the jar, I am guessing I might be a quicker churner than the instructions expected !

Equipment: Kilner Butter Churn or Electric Whisk / Butter Paddles or Equivalent

Churning Time 3-5 minutes / Patting Time 2 minutes

Ingredients

(makes 250g)

500ml double cream (organic)

1 tsp Himalayan Sea salt (optional)

Place the cream in your churner or in a small bowl if you are using a electric hand whisker or a kitchen aid and start to churn if you are using a electric whisk set the speed to the slowest. First you will achieve thick whipped cream and the churning will be stiffer, keep going until the churning becomes easy again and this is where you will have separated the buttermilk from the cream leaving you with butter.

This is how your separated butter and buttermilk should look when you are ready to start the butter patting stage this is to squeeze out the remainder of buttermilk

Drain off the buttermilk and keep in the fridge, this is what the best pancakes are made from, the buttermilk will keep for a couple of days. Now the fun part of squeezing the remainder of buttermilk from the butter and at this stage you can salt and or flavour your butter with anything you fancy. I will update on this, right now I fancy a Mexican zing as the corn in my garden is almost ready and I think I will flavour the butter with zesty lime, coriander and chilli for a Mexican butter coating for my corn on the cob.

If you do not have butter pats to hand then a pair of spatulas will suffice, place your squeezed butter on the worktop and roughly shape in to a rectangle then using the pats firm up the butter, wrap in grease proof paper and store in the fridge, this will keep for a few weeks in the fridge.

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LIFE MY PASSION

Welcome to my daily life of cooking, one winters day many years ago my family and I were all inspired by a back to back rainy day of River Cottage this got us to stop talking about and start actually doing, suddenly three weeks later eight vegetable beds were dug, greenhouse erected and our first vegetables were propagating, this was the start to raising and growing our own food, our fabulous son Oscar changed our path in life which lead us to sell our small thriving restaurant of 10 yrs and to start our new life (Terrifying!) a life of the self sufficient in touch with nature and seasons, taking a step back and looking forward to a slower change of pace and making the most of every moment.

My passion for cooking was stronger than ever and having time at home with Oscar I found I had a new direction and I was no longer striving for perfection, I was suddenly very passionate for the enjoyment of the other side of food, something I had not realised, being the Chef/Cook and every other duty of your own small restaurant made me see that I never actually took time to cook what I wanted!

So there I was muddy boots and hands digging deep in more than one sense and I found myself transported back in time to where everyone grew some of their own food, it is a wonderful world with a real sense of achievement and loss, Slugs Snails and Caterpillars! But thats another story! Childhood memories of summers when I lived with my grand parents reminded me of so much that I had learnt about the make do and mend generation that I had forgotten.

Now as a family we love our free wild food days where we gather what nature has provided, have gone from being mini mini garden urban small holders, who did raised pigs at home because we could not wait to find land and supporting ourselves from our garden to now owning a very small farm that allows us to grow more vegetables for the whole of our family and neighbours, raise our own gorgeous Gloucestershire Old Spot pigs, (Sausages!) and pets! Dorset Down sheep, chickens for eggs and pet goats! Suddenly having large quantities of produce started to wake up the Cook in me!

The Cook was awake that part of me that wants to cook for the masses and I found myself setting up Flowerpot Kitchen, a Farmers Market Stall, I wanted to use our honest raised meats and make old fashioned pork pies, rabbit pies and game pies from the local game keeper along with old fashioned techniques and the best hot water crust pastry. This in turn grew to a small cottage industry from home weekly supplying three farm shops and a deli along with also attending three farmers markets A few years later there came a time when my son Oscar's health changed and it was an easy decision to stop.

I still hold the occasional pop up 40 seater restaurant or gourmet lunch which we do for local charities for the love of sharing food and to remind that Cook in me why I love our go slower self sufficient life!

So here I am sitting amoung the vegetables watching the chickens loving that every season nature teaches me something new and that nature is in charge! She has taught me to just go with it and grow. Give it a try from a tray of salad on your windowsill to a few tomato plants it all counts.