I Can't Believe it's Homemade Butter

Until today, I thought making butter at home was an obsolete practice which involved stout women in colonial garb and hours of laborious churning. After reading a fellow blogger's post about how easy it was to make homemade butter, I decided I had to try it for myself. (thank you to Them Apples) Sure enough, it was as simple as shaking a jar. It took about 25 minutes for it to work through the stages of forming butter (which I used as a rare opportunity to give my arms a workout while sitting on the couch). After straining off the buttermilk, I rinsed the butter with ice water to remove any excess milk. I portioned it out into several small batches and rolled it up in wax paper for safe keeping. I also decided to make salted, thyme/parsley, and basil butter but the pure unsalted version was the smoothest, creamiest butter I have ever tasted. So the next time you have some bottled up frustration, take it out on a jar full of cream and then at least you will have something to show for all of your vigorous shaking.