Making Homemade Butter

Posted by Montserrat | 0 comments

It has been nine years since we’ve read the Little House series aloud. I can’t believe it’s been that long! My three oldest remember the books but the younger ones do not. I decided it was high time to read them again. It is the perfect way to fill our hot summer days.

Of course, to complete the experience it’s fun to do some of the same things Ma, Pa, Mary and Laura did. After reading about the butter Ma made in Little House in the Big Woods we decided to make our own. It was easy! The quotes come directly from the book.

“When the cream was ready, Ma scalded the long wooden churn-dash, put it in the churn, and dropped the wooden churn-cover over it. The churn-cover had a little round hole in the middle, and Ma moved the dash up and down, up and down, through the hole.”

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If we were being truly authentic we would have driven to my sister-in-law’s and gotten milk from the cow and used an old butter churn. Buttons in jars would act as the dash and cream from the store was used instead. We filled each jar halfway with heavy whipping cream and proceeded to shake, shake, shake!

“At first the splashes of cream showed thick and smooth around the little hole. After a long time they began to look grainy.”

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After about 7-10 minutes of shaking the cream is getting grainy! Still needs more shaking though.

“Then Ma churned more slowly, and on the dash there began to appear tiny grains of yellow butter.”

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Getting thicker but not done yet! Keep on shaking.

“When Ma took off the churn-cover, there was the butter in a golden lump, drowning in the buttermilk.”

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You know the butter is done when you have big globs of butter swimming in buttermilk.

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Pour off the buttermilk into another bowl. Add water to cover the butter and shake for about 30 seconds. Pour off the water, add more clean water, and shake again. Do this a total of 3-5 times to clean the butter. Add a few dashes of salt to give the butter flavor.

“Then Ma took out the lump with a wooden paddle, into a wooden bowl, and washed it many times in cold water, turning it over and over and working it with the paddle until the water ran clear. After that she salted it.”

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Creamy thick butter washed clean, salted, and ready to mold. The butter is now ready to eat. If you don’t have a mold just spread on bread and eat.

“Now came the best part of the churning. Ma molded the butter. On the loose bottom of the wooden butter-mold was carved the picture of a strawberry with two strawberry leaves.”

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One of our handmade butter molds we purchased from Lehman’s.

“With the paddle Ma packed butter tightly into the mold until it was full. Then she turned it upside-down over a plate, and pushed on the handle of the loose bottom.”

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Pack the butter into your mold. We had to set the molds in the freezer so the butter could harden before taking the butter pats out of the molds.

“The little, firm pat of golden butter came out, with the strawberry and its leaves molded on the top. Laura and Mary watched, breathless, one on each side of Ma, while the golden little butter pats, each with its strawberry on the top, dropped on to the plate as Ma put all the butter through the mold.”

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Our little pats of butter with bears and birds. What a fun way to connect with history!

Montserrat Wadsworth is completely devoted to her wonderful husband, Joseph, and their eight children (seven girls and one boy!). They live on a 4,000 acre alfalfa farm nestled in a small Northern Nevada valley. They’ve been homeschooling for 11+ years. Montserrat enjoys, photography, cooking, crafting, chocolate, and sloppy goodnight kisses. She strives to live each day as God would have her do following Mary’s biblical supplication, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.” (Luke 1:38) You can find her at her blog Chocolate On My Cranium.