Cultured Butter | Cook's Illustrated 12/18/20, 9:40 AM

Cultured Butter
SERVES About 2 cups butter; about 2 cups (450
grams) buttermilk

TIME 20 minutes, plus 24 hours resting and 25

minutes chilling

WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS

by Paul Adams
With the help of friendly bacteria, you can make
rich, tangy homemade butter that’s a lot more
interesting than the store-bought sticks. All it
takes is cream, a little starter culture, and time. If
you live in pasture country and can get fresh,
grass-fed cream straight from a nearby farm,
you’re in great shape. (Note that there are
dangers associated with unpasteurized milk,
especially for immunocompromised people.)
High-quality, flavorful cream makes the best
butter, no question, even without culturing it.
We highly suggest you seek out some of the good
stu! for this recipe. But if you don’t have a cow,
don’t have a cow! Regular supermarket heavy
cream is much improved when you patiently
culture it. In our testing, we tried both
pasteurized and ultrapasteurized heavy cream,
which are treated di!erently before packaging.
We also tested a cream that contained ingredients

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Cultured Butter | Cook's Illustrated 12/18/20, 9:40 AM

intended to make it stay foamed longer when it’s

whipped. The best batches were made with
pasteurized (rather than ultrapasteurized) cream
free of stabilizers.
The most exciting results, the ones that were
truly distinctive and unlike butters you can buy,
came from letting the culturing process continue
a full week. The flavors that developed were
strong and complex, bordering on funky and
cheesy.
Last but definitely not least, when you make
cultured butter, you get buttermilk! Plenty of it,
with the same nuanced tang as the butter—
perfect for making biscuits or marinades or even
for drinking as a refreshing fermented treat.
Diane St. Clair, whose butter farm we visited,
wrote a whole book about cooking with
buttermilk. Just be sure to save a couple of
tablespoons of it to culture your next batch of
butter.

INGREDIENTS BEFORE YOU BEGIN

1 quart heavy cream

* Milk and cream are subjected to heat
treatment to kill the bacteria that would
2 tablespoons
otherwise thrive in their nutrient-rich
buttermilk
environments. According to the International
¼ teaspoon salt Dairy Foods Association, cream labeled
(optional) “pasteurized” is generally heated and held at
161°F for 15 seconds. Increasingly common is
a method called ultrapasteurization, in which
the cream is held at 275°F or higher for just 1
or 2 seconds. This results in a longer shelf life,
but in our experience the butter it makes is

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Cultured Butter | Cook's Illustrated 12/18/20, 9:40 AM

not quite as flavorful as butter made with

regular pasteurized cream, possibly because
the culturing bacteria find ultrapasteurized
cream a less hospitable place to work their
charms.
The ideal temperature range for churning
butter is 55 to 60 degrees F/10 to 15.5 degrees
C. At colder temperatures, the fat is too firm,
and the thick cream just sticks to the sides of
the food processor bowl instead of churning
with the blades. At warmer temperatures, too
much of the fat is liquid instead of
crystallized, which results in a greasier final
product. In step 2, you can chill the cream in
the refrigerator or over an ice bath. You can
also refrigerate the cultured cream for several
days if that's convenient; just be sure to cover
it tightly to keep odors out. When you're ready
to turn it into butter, take the mixture out of
the refrigerator and, if necessary, let it warm
to 55 to 60 degrees F/10 to 15.5 degrees C.
Cream aged for one day will make a sweetish
butter with just a hint of tang. As the aging
process continues—especially at warmer
room temperatures—the cream gets more
and more pungent. After a week it may smell
almost too strong for some tastes, but most of
what you smell resides in the liquid portion
that gets separated out, leaving the butter
surprisingly mellow. Homemade cultured
butter also makes incredible browned butter.
Try it on your next pasta dish.

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Cultured Butter | Cook's Illustrated 12/18/20, 9:40 AM

INSTRUCTIONS
1 Combine cream and buttermilk in clean
lidded container. Cover container or close
carton and let sit at room temperature until
mixture smells tangy and buttery and has a
thick consistency, at least 24 hours or—our
recommendation—up to 1 week in cooler
seasons, checking daily.

2 Chill cream to 55 to 60 degrees F/10 to 15.5

degrees C.

3 Transfer cream to food processor and

process until mixture turns from grainy
whipped cream to lumps of butter splashing
in liquid, 1 to 3 minutes. Stop processor
immediately.

4 Fill medium bowl halfway with ice and

water. Line fine-mesh strainer with triple
layer of cheesecloth, leaving few inches of
cloth hanging over sides of strainer. Pour
butter mixture through cheesecloth-lined
strainer into large bowl (buttermilk will
collect in bowl). Lift cheesecloth by edges and
twist and squeeze tightly over strainer to
press out more buttermilk (when butter starts
to squeeze through cheesecloth, you are
done). Transfer cheesecloth-wrapped butter
to ice bath until firm around exterior, about 2
minutes. Transfer buttermilk to airtight
container; do not wash bowl.

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Cultured Butter | Cook's Illustrated 12/18/20, 9:40 AM

5 Remove butter from cheesecloth and

transfer to now-empty bowl. Stir and press
with wooden spoon (a metal utensil will
conduct heat from your hands and make the
butter soft) to force out additional buttermilk
from butter, 1 to 2 minutes. Drain this
buttermilk from bowl, add to buttermilk
container, and refrigerate until ready to use. If
making salted butter, knead salt into butter
with wooden spoon. Transfer butter to
separate airtight container and refrigerate
until ready to use. (Butter can be refrigerated
for up to 2 months.)

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