I have not purchased butter from the grocery store all of 2025 and I don’t plan to break my streak… Ever. When I first discovered how easy it is to make butter, I knew I had to try it for myself. It had to be a joke! Spoiler alert – it wasn’t. Not only is is quick and easy to make, but it tastes so much better than anything from the store, and it’s quite a fun process. Let me give you all of the homemade butter details.
Homemade Butter Ingredients:
Heavy whipping cream. That is it. Yup, you read that right. It only takes one ingredient to make your own butter! Appliance wise, there are many different ways to make butter. You don’t need anything fancy. You can make it with a blender, food processor, stand mixer, hand-held mixer, butter churner… I have even heard of some people shaking it intensly in a mason jar. I mean, why not have a quick arm workout at the same time? Work.
Personally, I use my food processor. However, I used to use a very cheap blender and even a mini processor (you know, the ones that come with immersion blenders) prior to my food processor. I find it to be the easiest and most hands-off. I just let it do it’s thing and come back 5-10 minutes later, all ready.
This is optional, but I use latex gloves. You do have to touch the butter quite a bit and I am not a fan of the residue it leaves on your hands or, even worse, under my nails…
Finally, you will need either a fine mesh strainer or cheesecloth and a bowl of ice water. To be fair, I have done it with just cold water when I couldn’t be bothered and it turned out just fine. But ice is better!
How To Make Butter:
Put your heavy cream in your appliance/container of choice and start mixing at a high speed. I never measure, but I would recommend at least half a liter in order to get a good butter yield. Within a few minutes, it will turn to whipped cream. Continue letting it mix, making sure to scrape down the sides if needed, and it will start to thicken up and look similar to a paste. This means you are getting close! Finally, the solids and liquids will separate and you can turn it off when the separation is very apparent and chunky.
Strain the butter and squeeze out any excess liquid that you can with your hands, gloves optional. The liquid is buttermilk, so don’t throw it away! Save that liquid gold for another recipe. Place your butter in a bowl of ice water and fold the butter over itself, sort of like a gentle knead. The point here is to remove as much buttermilk as possible. The more you remove, the longer your butter will last. Switch out the water when it gets too cloudy and repeat until clear. The reason for the ice is to keep the butter mostly solid and easy to handle after being warmed up by your hands.
At this point, feel free to mix in salt, garlic, herbs, or anything else you fancy. I tend to keep mine plain or sometimes, I will break off a small amount and do a mini flavored butter. Place your butter in plastic wrap, parchement paper, a jar, ramekin, etc and shape according to your preference. My choice is always plastic wrap that I will remove after it’s been in the fridge for a few hours, and a log shape.
And there you have it! That is how you make some delicious, fresh, homemade butter. Cool, right? I tend to make enough to last me a week, but I have had some hold up for two weeks after a holiday. I have never had to throw any away since making it myself.
Side note: as a little clean-up tip, run all of the items that are covered in butter in hot running water. It will help melt a lot of that residue away and make it much easier to properly clean afterwards!
Is It Worth It?
This is subjective. From a cost-savings perspective, it will more than likely cost you more money to purchase heavy whipping cream than the butter itself. It depends on where you live and where you purchase these ingredients.
The reason that I make my own butter is to avoid any added preservatives or unecessary ingredients. Heavy whipping cream should be the only ingredient in butter, and it never is. Knowing what is in the food that I eat is worth the extra cost to me.
Another thing to keep in mind is the buttermilk. This is not sold in Switzerland or France, so this is a huge winning point for me. It is a fortunate biproduct of making butter and needs to be taken into consideration.
Finally, I have noticed that my homemade butter is much more potent than store bought. If a recipe calls for 100 grams of butter, I will use 70 grams, max. If I use more, it ends up being too buttery. I always use less for recipes, especially when it comes to baking. This is a massive strong point for me. On top of that? It tastes better. We recently stayed at a well-known luxury castle/hotel and ate at their restaurant. My butter actually held it’s own compared to their well-known chef’s butter, which you could tell was homemade as well. I was so proud.
With all of this in mind, I would say I am close to breaking even. Even if I wasn’t, I would still continue to make it because of the ingredients point and the fact that this is a massive hobby of mine. I love making things from scratch. What about you? Will you be giving homemade butter a shot?
Or perhaps you are curious as to what other everyday items you could make from scratch? Then check out these easy homemade kitchen staples! Butter is, of course, featured.
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Stay Chaotic,
Tess
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