Meet my new Best Friend

Let me introduce my new daily friend in the kitchen!  

Mr. Blendtec

The Blendtec is basically like having a garbage disposal 

in a blender.....it can pulverize anything - ANYTHING!

You can put any kind of fruit, peelings and all, 

and it grinds it into either juice, smoothies or 

even ice cream - yes, ice cream.  You simply add ice, 

milk, fruit and honey, press a button and 60 seconds

later you have home made ice cream.  If that blows

your mind, get this.....it also makes soup!  Just

throw in a whole tomato, a carrot, some celery, 

a chicken bullion cube, some liquid like water

or wine and fresh herbs. Press the soup button 

and again, 60 seconds later, you have hot fresh soup that 

is nothing but fresh vegetables!  I could go on and on

about this blender but I need to get to today's project.

Homemade butter!

After my great success in the yogurt department, 

I decided to venture out to butter.  Like yogurt,

I have tried to make butter in the past with little success.

But with the Blendtec.....my confidence knows no bounds.

So, I opened up some cartons of whipping cream, 

added a pinch of salt, pressed 

a button and waited for my butter.  Sixty

seconds later, no butter.  Now, Mr. Blendtec

was bowed up and flexing...

"press the button again", Mr. Blendtec said.

Success did not come to me today....

After pressing the button several times, it became 

clear that for the first time in the two months I 

have owned my Blendtec, a wonderful creation 

was not coming out of it. Not to be discouraged,

I quickly poured my cream into what used to be my 

best kitchen buddy - the Kitchen Aid mixer.

Sitting in the corner, dusty and out of shape, 

I think my mixer smiled to see that he was still 

needed and not totally cast aside for my new BFF.

Mr. Kitchen Aid got right to work and within a minute had 

done his usual job of whipping cream.  With

a satisfied smirk on his face, he grinned at Mr. 

Blendtec.  "Not so fast",  Mr. Blendtec said back to 

him...."she wants butter, not whipped cream".  Now

we were into uncharted territory, but always up 

for the task, Mr. Kitchen Aid started mixing again.

The cream got firmer and started lumping together

Wow, it was actually starting to look like butter!

"I think I can, I think I can" was just barely audible

over Mr. Kitchen Aid's steady hum.  And the little engine that could ~

DID! (make butter)

But wait there is more....making butter is a two for one

special!  What do you get when you make butter ~

BUTTERMILK

(of course)

This is no joke....buttermilk is the by-product of making 

butter.  All these years, I never knew what buttermilk 

was.  Now that I think of it, the name is self explanatory;

but I didn't know that is how it is made.

And if you like buttermilk, you get a bit more of 

it by rinsing your new homemade butter with

cold water and saving the runoff water to add to 

the original buttermilk ~ who knew!

Drain the runoff to get the small bits of butter out.

I took the butter and filled the "butter crock" that my

 mother gave me years ago and

 now have to think of a yummy recipe to make 

with my homemade buttermilk.   

"Buttermilk pancakes",  Mr. Blendtec excitedly yelled.

"Remember, I made them the other day and they 

were delicious?  And don't forget the banana and chocolate

chip muffins we made, that recipe calls for buttermilk too. The 

cross country team went crazy over those muffins!" 

Mr. Blendtec was looking so shiny!  

A quite little voice coming from the direction 

of Mr. Kitchen Aid said; "Make new friends, but keep 

the old, one is silver and the other is gold!"