Better living through chemistry

Ty is better, much better. That's a relief. The second dose of daily antibiotics perked him up today and we were able to go out for brunch with Grandmama.
Didn't have time to make the craft I wanted to make since the boys were more interested in helping Daddy out in the garage ... I dragged them to Trader Joe's nonetheless.
One thing I did today was to make butter! It was a little fun experiment I had set for myself after ordering the cream from the farm last week. It was incredibly easy and though I had originally planned on involving the boys (a lot of shaking of the cream is involved), I decided to use Mama's White Machine (KitchenAid mixer) to do the deed. Owen and Ty couldn't be pried off the tool bench and apparently Daddy needed help changing his rear tire before the race tomorrow.
Anyways, I started off with the thick, heavy cream. Kept a bit on the side ... I had "sweet" plans for that batch.

the whipping begins

just past the whipped cream stage

starting to really separate and form little butter lumps

here's the butter and buttermilk at the bottom of the bowl

Then I rinsed the butter in ice water to get rid of the last little bit of buttermilk. Apparently it goes sour rather fast if you skip that step.

buttermilk on the left and butter rinsing on the right

Here is the result after I added a bit of salt ... I LOVE salted butter. It's the french, and particularly the "Breton" side of me that requires salt in my butter. 

well, I knew what I had to do after that ... homemade butter on homemade bread? Yes please!

As for the left over heavy cream?

hmmm strawberries and whipped cream!

Hmmmmmmmm .. that was the best whipped cream EVER.