How To Make Butter In A Kitchen Aid Mixer

Skip buying butter from the grocery store and make your own instead! My easy to follow instructions will have you churning butter and feeling like an 18th century milk-maid in no time.

Why Make Your Own Butter?

Since we own a family milk cow, we have our own supply of cream to use up and what better way to use up cream than to churn our own fresh raw butter? If you haven’t tried fresh raw butter, my friend, you are missing out! Spread it on sourdough toast or pancakes and you will be in culinary bliss.

Not only does it taste butter (hehe), but you control what ingredients (or lack thereof) are added to your butter. Plus, it contains so many health benefits!

What Are The Benefits Of Butter?

I’m glad you asked. When raw (meaning not pasteurized), butter contains all the essential nutrients and beneficial enzymes that would otherwise be damaged or destroyed during the process of pasteurization.

During this process, the lactase enzyme is destroyed which inhibits our ability to properly digest the sugar lactose. Thus, many people are led to self-diagnose as lactose-intolerant. More about that here.

When you make your own raw butter at home, you’re ensuring the quality of your food and thus, the health of yourself and your family. Plus, its so much fun to witness that cream churn into butter!

Kitchen Tools You Will Need To Make Raw Butter:

• Kitchen Aid
• Whisk Attachment (this will come with your Kitchen Aid)
• Plastic bag or large tea towel
• Parchment Paper
• Wooden paddle

Ingredients To Make Raw Butter:

• Raw cream skimmed (or whipping cream)
• Salt (we like Redmond Real Salt for their quality)
• Vitamin E capsule (optional)

How To Make Raw Butter In A Kitchen Aid Mixer:

First of all, I’d like to note that this process may take quite some time, depending on how thick your cream is, the temperature of your cream and even the temperature of your house. I’ve had butter churn in 6 minutes and butter churn in 25 minutes. Just be patient!

Also, this is one of the easiest things you can do. It may sound intimidating, but trust me it’s simpler than you think. And so much fun.

The first thing you’re going to do is pour your cream, straight from the fridge, into your mixer and add the whisk attachment.

Lock the head and turn the speed to 8. Then, put a plastic grocery store bag OR a large tea towel over the kitchen aid to avoid splashes. You can also buy a kitchen aid splash guard, but I’ve never tried one. Let me know in the comments if you do!

Your cream will go through phases: first, it will expand in volume and turn into a light fluffy whipped cream. Scoop some up, add some sugar and top your coffee while you wait!.

Next, it will start becoming thinner and look a bit darker and sort of gradient.

After some time, you’ll start to hear a different sound, sort of a splashing: this is when the fat begins separating!

Resist the urge to stop the mixer and let it continue until the butter globules are mostly all sticking to each other and the whisk attachment.

Your buttermilk (the liquid leftover) should be mostly smooth and not have too many globs of butter in it. If it does, turn your mixer back on high (feel free to go full speed here) for another 10-20 seconds.

Now, wash your hands really well and gather the butter all together against the side of the kitchen aid bowl. It should stick to the side fairly well enough for you to pour your buttermilk into a container and stick in the fridge.

Next, you want to wash your buttermilk with cold water. This is to remove any remaining buttermilk that may be hiding in your butter in order to keep it from going rancid quicker.

There are two methods to do this: wash by hand or use the dough hook attachment on your kitchen aid.

Either way, add about a cup or two of cold water to your kitchen aid bowl. It doesn’t really matter how much water you add if you wash by hand, but if you use your dough hook attachment and add too much water to your bowl, it will splash.

Wash your butter, squeezing and kneading it with your hands, folding it in and over itself, dumping the water out and adding more water until your water is mostly clear.

If you’d prefer, you can simply wash it under the kitchen faucet, too.

Make sure to squeeze all the water out of your butter. Sometimes, I like to take a paper towel and soak up any extra moisture.

Now, it’s time to add your salt! Take a square of parchment paper (large enough to wrap your butter in later) and lay your butter on the parchment paper.

I usually do 1-2 teaspoons of salt per pound of butter. You don’t have to salt it, however it helps preserve your butter and again, keep it from going rancid quicker.

If you’d like to preserve your butter even more and keep it on the counter in your kitchen, this would be the time to add your capsule of Vitamin E. Just cut off the end of the capsule with some scissors and drizzle over your butter and fold in and over itself.

I prefer to use a wooden paddle like this one to shape my butter. If you have butter molds, you can use those too!

Go ahead and shape your butter however you’d like! Once your finished, wrap it up and stick into a zip lock freezer bag, label the date, and throw it in the freezer or refrigerator.

Or, if you want to keep it on the counter, I like to stick mine in my butter bell that a sweet friend gifted me to stay fresh and soft for things like toast or pancakes! You can grab one similar to mine here.

If you’d like to culture your buttermilk, see this post (post soon to come!). Or, if you’re looking for ideas to use up your buttermilk and your butter, make my einkorn pancakes or einkorn chocolate chip muffins. You can even bake sourdough with buttermilk! Just substitute the water.

Let me know in the comments how you liked this recipe or if you have any questions! I’d also love if you rated this recipe and shared with friends.

Also, see my FAQ’s down below!

Frequently Asked Questions:

Can I Make This With Store Bought Cream?

If you don’t have access to raw milk and you’re wondering if you can make your own butter from store-bought cream, the answer is a resounding YES.

However, because store-bought cream may be thicker than my hand-skimmed cream, you may find that your butter churns much quicker than mine. Let me know in the comments if you find this to be so!

Do I Have To Add Salt And Vitamin E?

No, you don’t! These ingredients just help to prevent your butter from going rancid quicker. Most people like the added flavor of the salt, too. However, if you plan on baking with your butter and your recipe requires a certain amount of salt, you may want to skip salting.

What Do I Do With All The Leftover Buttermilk?

Lots of things! Fresh buttermilk is delicious and so good for you. You can use it in any baked goods like biscuits or pancakes. I add to mac and cheese, muffins, sourdough and sometimes even soups! There are endless possibilities.

How Much Butter Will This Recipe Make?

It depends on a couple of different factors: how thick your cream is and how much cream you are using. Using hand skimmed cream, I normally get a pound of butter for every 2 quarts of cream I have.