The Jan/Feb 2009 issue of Hobby Farms has an article on making butter from heavy Whipping Cream. have any on you done this? I am thinking of this as something to do with the Heavy Whipping cream that I often see marked down after the holidays.  They talk about 2 pints of cream makes about 2 cups of butter. she mentioned doing it with the electric mixer.

Any thoughts? 

I make butter regularly, but I buy whole, unhomogenized milk, so it's worth it cost-wise. I think butter would be very expensive if you bought heavy cream to make it from. I wouldn't do it with an electric mixer, because it would be hard to clean up and you'd lose a lot of butter in the process. It isn't hard to do as Joyous said. Put it in a jar, don't fill it more than 2/3 of the way. Bring it close to room temperature and shake it until the butter separates. Wash it several times, drain well and salt if if you like.  

I don't remember washing the butter, but perhaps I wasn't involved in that process. How do you wash the butter? Does it go on cheesecloth and rinsed like pasta?

 My children both did this in first grade.  The first graders cook a dinner for their parents and the class made butter by putting it into a jar and shaking.The butter tasted as good as anything I've bought from the store.

One of the best birthday gifts I ever got was a churn .. I make butter all the time  we milk 6 cows and we make butter about 4 times a week

Joyous:

I don't remember washing the butter, but perhaps I wasn't involved in that process. How do you wash the butter? Does it go on cheesecloth and rinsed like pasta?

Use a wooden spoon to work the butter and wet it first so the butter won't stick so much. You put water in the jar the butter was made in and mix with a spoon, as if you were trying to mix the water into the butter. Pour it off and do it again until the water runs fairly clear. Let it drain, propping the jar at an angle for awhile, stir again to get out any water bubbles, then remove from the jar and salt it lightly and stir again. 

I mix mine with olive oil to make it healthier and to keep it from being so hard since it has to be stored in the refrigerator if you're going to keep it more than a couple of weeks.  

Mom made it at least once when I was a little girl. We had access to wonderful milk from Whitey the Cow. She was a prize winning cow (butter fat & cream). I think Mom used her mixer to make it. I don't remember if it tasted different or not.

gayla50:

One of the best birthday gifts I ever got was a churn .. I make butter all the time  we milk 6 cows and we make butter about 4 times a week

Gayla, when we were milking our own cow, we started out to go to garage sales one Saturday morning. We stopped at a friend's house and he asked what we were going to look for. I told him "a churn!" The first garage sale we went to, out of town, had one of those square jar churns with the red handle - I can't remember the brand of it now, but it was an old one that worked perfectly. I paid $2 for it. Our friend was flabbergasted and kept saying something like "you must be living right." That was a thrill.

I used the churn for years, but got rid of it when I moved to town, thinking that I wouldn't need it again. Now I can get raw whole milk and I churn butter from it - wish I had the old churn back.  

Pat:

had one of those square jar churns with the red handle

We had one of those jars too growing up, and when our neighbors had a milk cow we bought milk from them, separated out the cream and made butter in the jar.  Much later on the jar broke, and it would have been over $100 to replace it.  So it didn't get replaced.  It sure made good butter though.  Edey