Orange Rosemary Butter

Good things come from cows I always say. Steaks, burgers, bone marrow, ice cream, cheese and butter! Butter is a favourite ingredient for me in a lot of dishes I make as well as a topping for all sorts of food. Almost everything tastes better with a bit of butter in my opinion. With this in mind, I set forth with making a compound butter infused with orange and rosemary, a favourite flavour combination of mine.

 

The ingredients:

• 1 litre Thickened or heavy cream
• Zest from 2 oranges
• Salt
• Rosemary

 The procedure:

 

Zest your 2 oranges. You get the zest from the rind where the orange's essential oils are. You can use a fine grater but be careful you don't overdo it as it can get bitter. What you're after is just the top-most layer of the orange's rind. Now chop your rosemary up and set these 2 ingredients aside.

 

Pour your cream into a bowl and cover it with some plastic wrap. If you have a mixing bowl with a cover, then use the cover. The cream will splatter all over your kitchen so it is important that you cover it. Now put your mixer in and put it on low. You can do this manually without a mixer but it will take you about a few hours of continuous churning to get the same result. Now keep on mixing the cream until it stiffens and then breaks down and separates. You'll know it as it will splatter everywhere inside the bowl. (Now aren't you glad you covered it?)

 

Once you uncover the bowl, you'll see that there's something yellow and something milky inside. The yellow stuff is butter! Separate the liquid which is buttermilk and the butter. Strain it so that all the buttermilk has been squeezed out. Mix some salt in and then mix your orange zest and rosemary. Now put in a container and throw it in the refrigerator so it can solidify. Voila! Orange Rosemary Butter! Now where do you use it? On steaks, on muffins and waffles or whatever you wish! 

 

Here are some photos:

 

zest the orange by removing the top-most layer from the rind.

orange zest.

chopped rosemary.

thickened cream.

pour your cream into the bowl.

cover the bowl.

make sure you have a hole for the mixer to go through the cover.

put your mixer in and start it up.

as the cream breaksdown and separates, you'll see it change right in front of your eyes.

just before it turns into butter, it will splatter everywhere!

there you go! fresh butter!

open the bowl and you'll see the butter and buttermilk.

squeeze the buttermilk from the butter and strain it.

the butter would be very soft.

mix in some salt.

throw in the orange zest.

pour in the rosemary.

put the compound butter into a container and put it in your refrigerator.

 

If you prefer plain butter, then just don't put in the orange zest and rosemary. And orange zest can leave a stain on some plates. It's best to quickly wash it after.

 

Ciao!