Mercedes and the Girls

Zada had full reign of the house as we are trying to get ready for tomorrow and all our Gravenstreter guests!

For the past week, Jon has had cream culturing with a buttermilk inoculation so we can enjoy cultured butter with our feast tomorrow.  The cultured cream has to be at exactly the right temperature before beginning to churn.

Once reached, he used the tiny dinky food processor that came with our immersion blender to do it in batches.  We have wanted a large food processor for years, and we finally got one!  Then, it was delayed in delivery, and that delay gave Jon more time to research and get one he liked better.  But that also meant we had to use the tiny one for this project, which was sad.

But it still worked!  I was surprised the blades separate out the whey as well as they do.

After processing, the butter and whey is poured into a cheesecloth lined bowl

and wrung out to remove as much of the whey as possible.  In hindsight, Jon would have preferred to squeeze out the whey in smaller batches, but he just did one.

And an immediate ice bath to harden the butter solids, and into the fridge it goes!  It was still a little wet with whey, and the taste was still a little tart, so next time he will definitely squeeze in batches, but it tastes really good!

I went outside to check on my snow cooling turkey brine, and heard what I thought were an enormous number of geese.  I called Jon out, and we could see them flying in huge groups up in the sky, and Jon thought they were actually egrets.  They just kept circling in the sky before finally winging their way south in formation.

My brine was finally ready, and in the (expensive, all natural, free range) turkey went to sit overnight.

I managed to get the giant bucket in the garage fridge with only a little drippy spill, so that was a success!

Miss Zada was at her leisure this evening, with her feet up, and pointing at the things she wanted.  She is such a funny little child.  She brings such joy to all of us.