Those of you that have a interest in my small dairy herd and cheese making attempts will know of my problems with butter. I've tried many, many times with no success, had a whole heap of advice from twitter (cheese makers and butter people on twitter are amazingly helpful). I was going to borrow the sherman tank of food processors off a mate of mine, The Snackqueen, but thought I'd give it another go this morning. Well sacrificing 7 virgins* seemed to do the trick because I finally achieved butter.
I cultured the cream with a bit of natural yoghurt, sat it on the bench during the day then chilled it overnight. Within a few minutes of beating I could tell it was different, the cream was thickening! It took a fair bit more to get the butter to separate out and the stem blender was pretty warm by then but I had butter.
I really need to get the mixer going so that i don't have to stand over it for half an hour but there is no stopping me now, hopefully soon Lantanaland will have a stockpile of homemade butter in the freezer.
*no actual virgins sacrificed. Couldn't find any at Beenleigh Woolies.