Monday, February 06, 2017

And Then There was Butter!

Awhile back I blogged about making butter using my stand mixer.  It was fun and I wanted to make butter on a regular basis.  Clearly I got distracted because I never made any more.


Well, the other day while looking for a few kitchen items at Bed Bath and Beyond I ran across this little goody.  A little butter churn!  Isn't it cute?


Yes, I thought so, too.  It is by Kilner, a leading UK brand of canning  jars.  It is well made, easy to use and easy to clean.

 Here I am pouring the pint of cream into the jar-- it would have held more but I decided to go slow.  The instructions say to leave the cream out for 2 hours to come to room temperature.  The instructions said that by leaving the cream out, it would only take 10 minutes to churn the butter.  I left the cream out for the 2 hours and set about churning.  The instructions were wrong.  It took about 15 minutes for the solids to begin separating from the butter milk but it finally did and this is what it looked like.
At this point I poured the buttermilk off, put the solids into a bowl of ice water and washed it -- twice.  Then I squeezed the water out of the butter as in the picture below.
 After I felt I had all the water out I shaped it into a rectangular shape and added some salt and there you go!

And here is the buttermilk that came off the butter -- it will be used for scones tomorrow!

My review of the little churn is good -- I liked it.  It was harder than you might think, my arm got tired and my husband had to help but we got some nice butter and I will definitely be doing it again.

Trueluck Summer by Susan Gabriel

Today I finished a novel by Susan Gabriel titled "Trueluck Summer".  The synopsis caught my attention because it described an adventure involving a 12 year old Trudy Trueluck and her 70 year old grandmother, Ida.  It sounded like it could be comical or poignant or whimsical.

However, it was historical fiction taking place during the civil rights movement, specifically 1964. It was engaging and a quick read.  It flowed well and I enjoyed the characterization and the setting.  However, again, maybe not the right time for me because it was all wrapped up in the political and social unrest of the time.  I lived through that unrest so it wasn't particularly entertaining from that aspect.

I would recommend the book, it was good, funny, had a good ending -- it was a bit "To Kill a Mockingbird--esque".  However, one thing that I realized reading this book is the same thing that I realized reading the last book I read and reviewed -- not much has changed in our society.

Unconscious Mutterings hosted by LunaNina.com

Unconscious Muttering is hosted by LunaNina.  Visit the site lunanina.com to participate.
 
 
Week 731
I say ... and you think ... ?
  1. Online ::  too much
  2. Balance ::  pilates
  3. Grunge ::  style
  4. Beacon ::   lighthouse
  5. Laughing ::  not enough of
  6. Comedy ::  tragedy
  7. Animated ::  cartoon
  8. Campaign ::  yuck
  9. Heather ::   Scotland
  10. Comma ::   too often misused


Hmmm...not very witty but it is Monday.

Update

 Ok, so we visited our cardiologist yesterday to get the lay of the land for the Hubs.  Seems there is an issue with one of the grafts from ...