Today we were busy with many chores on the farm. One was taking FIVE hours to shake and make butter! UGH! It was a family event. The littles had quart jars with 2 cups cream to shake and the rest had 1/2 gallon jars with a quart of cream at a time. I will not be surprised if all my kiddo's are complaining of achy arms tomorrow. :-) I kept busy draining off the butter milk and rinsing the butter, then when we were all done salting and packaging it. Four gallons of raw cream from our organically raised grass fed only cows gave us 7.25 pounds of butter. I package them in 1/4 pound = 1/2 cup portions individually wrapped then put four of them equaling one pound into a quart freezer bag. I wore gloves for most of the process because I was concerned about my body absorbing the fat. I didn't wear them for the final packaging and may regret it tomorrow when I hop on the scale.
The four of us who are on phase 2 of the hcg protocol usually drink about 1/2 gallon of cream a day while on phase 3, 4, and maintenance. So we had to come up with a way to use the cream since we aren't eating it. AND I do NOT have enough room in my freezer for making all of it into ice cream and cream cheese clouds. To our family raw organic cream from grass fed cows is called Liquid Gold. :-) So any cream that our friends cannot use we are making into butter to freeze. I may end up making some cream cheese clouds and storing them until phase 3. I have cream cheese in the freezer too. I do sometimes use cream to make cream cheese and will end up making some of that too. I think I'm going to call my Amish friend on Monday who has a butter churner and see what she would charge me to help me with the butter making process. Hopefully I can pay her in driving or butter. But spending 5 hours on 7 pounds of butter is just not an option for me. We still have about 3 quarts to shake, and I have another 3 gallons of cream from today in the fridge. We empty our milk tank to clean it every 2 days. When there is milk left we drain the skim milk into buckets to feed to the farm animals and keep the cream for us. Anyway, I'm exhausted and CRABY... oops, mom's are never supposed to be craby! :-)
Oh well, since butter is $3 a pound, having my own home grown butter that is from cows that are the healthiest on the planet makes the day worth it...... maybe. :-)
Thankful to have found you! Love seeing new P2 recipes to help me along my HCG adventure. Tickled to see you listed Created to be his Helpmeet as one of your books. I've never seen anyone else say anything about this life changing book. Good luck to you and your family on your P2. Lord bless, Dawn
ReplyDeleteWelcome Dawn. That book changed my life and my marriage both for the better! :-) Hope you'll find the info here helpful and a blessing.
ReplyDeleteI agree. I have that one on my RE-read list for this year. :)
ReplyDeleteHave you tried doing the butter in a mixer or blender? I haven't yet, but my Vitamix blender says I can do it.
ReplyDeleteAlyssa
I have used my kitchen aid mixer and it is a mess! I recently had a friend suggest a food processor, which was on my wish list... hubby just bought me one which will arrive next week! She says it only takes 3-4 minutes in the processor. I don't have a vitamix yet.... on the wish list! :-)
ReplyDeleteWhat are cream cheese clouds? Sounds wonderful! : )
ReplyDeleteWe have raw milk, too. Milk is one of the things I'm missing most. Waaaa! :)
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I was going to suggest the kitchenaid as that's what I use. I do have the large kitchenaid, though. Do you have the shield that goes around the bowl? That helps tremendously. It still takes awhile and you can only do a bit at a time, but at least you can get other stuff done at the same time.
Ok, I so want to try some of your cream and all of it's alter egos. So wish I lived closer to help take some of your extra off your hands!!! I'm sure it would just make having to eat my Land O'Lakes a disappointing experience. Do you have any tips for finding farms in the area that would sell raw cream like your family uses?
ReplyDeleteTahsha, I believe you can do a google search for "eat wild" and they have a list of folks who sell directly off their farm or as co-ops. :-) I usually tell people to try asking around at health food stores, Naturalpathic and chiropractic offices. Sometimes these folks will be in the "know" about real food and raw milk. :-)
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