HOW TO MAKE BUTTER!

"If you are afraid of butter, just use cream"- Julia Child

Start with cream, preferably from raw, grass-fed cow's milk. When you get the milk form the farm, you'll notice that the cream will have risen to the top of the milk. Pour out the cream as best as you can into a clear glass container (you'll still get a bit of milk, it's ok). Leave it in the fridge until you can see the cream on the top, a bit of milk on the bottom. Scoop out that cream, save the milk!

Place the cream in the Cuisinart (I tried using a mixer, it splattered all over the place, total mess) and turn it on until you start to see the cream take on a different consistency, just a few minutes. You can also place the cream in a jar and shake it until it "turns". Voilà, the butter! See how yellow it is? It's from all the grass the cows are eating, so cool! The white liquid is butter-milk!

Now we will separate the butter from the buttermilk. Pour everything from the Cuisinart into a strainer over a bowl, then save your buttermilk for baking. You can make pancakes with it, or Lefse, a Scandinavian bread that looks sort of like a crepe (check out James Beard's recipe).

When you sort of jiggle the strainer up and down and sideways (sort of roll it like a hoola-hoop) to pour out the buttermilk, you'll notice that the butter turns into a ball. You can leave it as is and eat it that way, but it will not last very long because it still has some buttermilk in it. If you want it to last longer, proceed to the next, final step.

Place the butter in a bowl, and cover it with ice-cold water. Squeeze the butter with your hands, or a fork, to "wash" the rest of the buttermilk out of the butter. When the water turns turvy, throw it out, and put in fresh ice water until the water stays clear when the butter is squeezed. Keep it all cold, though, or else you'll have butter all over your hands. Take the little ball, and place it in your favorite ramekin or whatever container you choose to show off your skills with!

Here it is, wonderful, super-tasty, beautiful yellow butter! 

To store your great butter, use a butter crock (this one made by Le Creuset), and keep it outside the fridge. It will keep your butter with a nice consistency, and surprisingly cool.

We learned the joys of room-temperature butter from the great Roger Oyster (a.k.a. "the chief"), who shocked the entire Grand Teton Music Festival by keeping his butter in the cabinet above the stove for an entire summer.