How to Make Butter

Marie Overton
Dec 14, 2020
2 min read

Updated: May 22

Butter is a fundamental ingredient in tons of recipes and a staple in any kitchen. Have you ever wanted to make your own? It’s easier than you ever imagined and only takes two simple ingredients; 1 pint of heavy cream and 1/8 teaspoon of salt (optional).

Instructions

Pour the room-temperature cream into your KitchenAid, food processor, or mixing bowl. If it is cold it will eventually separate but it will take a really long time.

Whip the cream using the whisk beater until it gets to a whipped cream consistency.

Keep the beaters on low until it starts to thicken up.

At this point, we switch from the whisk beater to the flat beater. You could continue to mix with the whisk, but it will take longer to separate.

Mixer with thick, white cream in a stainless steel bowl. Blue mixer head contrasts with grey countertop and tiled backsplash.

whipped cream consistency

Essentially at this point, it is whipped cream but you want to continue beating it past this stage.

First, the cream will start to lose its fluff. Then, you will start to notice little bits of butter separating. You might be tempted to stop at this point but continue a little while longer.

Mixer blending creamy batter in a metal bowl. The mixture is pale yellow and smooth, surrounded by splashes of flour on the sides.

beginning to separate

Continue mixing until you see yellow buttery solids and a cloudy liquid separate fully. This is the butter and the buttermilk.

Mixer bowl with curdled mixture and paddle attachment. Creamy white lumps in liquid; steel bowl on a dark counter, hint of blue machine.

fully separated

Butter After it separates

Once it separates, turn off the mixer and pour the buttermilk into a clean container to be used in one of my fabulous buttermilk recipes. (Layered Buttermilk Rolls are one of my favorites https://wisdompreserved.life/how-to-make-layered-buttermilk-rolls/) You can transfer the butter into a smaller bowl or use the mixing bowl for the next step.

It’s time to rinse the butter. Pour cold water over the butter and using a spatula knead the butter flushing as many of the pockets of buttermilk out of the butter as you can.

Pour off the rinse water and repeat until your butter rinse is mostly clear and no more buttermilk is coming out of the butter.

Curds in water in a metal bowl with a blue spatula, highlighting a blending process. Pale colors and smooth texture dominate the scene.

rinse

Drain out the rinse water. Stir salt or other flavors, if desired, into your soft butter and then store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. Use within 2 weeks or wrap in plastic and freeze for later use.