Friday, September 5, 2008

Storage Recipes - Canning Butter

CANNING BUTTER

Jars of Canned Butter & Hamburger Rocks.

Now you can purchase canned butter from The Internet Grocer http://www.internet-grocer.net/butter.htm or make it yourself using the directions below.

1. Use any butter that is on sale. Lesser quality butter requires more shaking (see #5 below), but the results are the same as with the expensive brands.

2. Heat pint jars in a 250 degree oven for 20 minutes, without rings or seals. One pound of butter slightly more than fills one pint jar, so if you melt 11 pounds of butter, heat 12 pint jars. A roasting pan works well for holding the pint jars while in the oven.
3. While the jars are heating, melt butter slowly until it comes to a slow boil. Using a large spatula, stir the bottom of the pot often to keep the butter from scorching. Reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes at least: a good simmer time will lessen the amount of shaking required (see #5 below). Place the lids in a small pot and bring to a boil, leaving the lids in simmering water until needed.

4. Stirring the melted butter from the bottom to the top with a soup ladle or small pot with a handle, pour the melted butter carefully into heated jars through a canning jar funnel. Leave 3/4" of head space in the jar, which allows room for the shaking process.

5. Carefully wipe off the top of the jars, then get a hot lid from the simmering water, add the lid and ring and tighten securely. Lids will seal as they cool. Once a few lids "ping," shake while the jars are still warm, but cool enough to handle easily, because the butter will separate and become foamy on top and white on the bottom. In a few minutes, shake again, and repeat until the butter retains the same consistency throughout the jar.

6. At this point, while still slightly warm, put the jars into a refrigerator. While cooling and hardening, shake again, and the melted butter will then look like butter and become firm. This final shaking is very important! Check every 5 minutes and give the jars a little shake until they are hardened in the jar! Leave in the refrigerator for an hour.

7. Canned butter should store for 3 years or longer on a cool, dark shelf. [It does last a long time. We have just used up the last of the butter we canned in 1999, and it was fine after 5 years..] Canned butter does not "melt" again when opened, so it does not need to be refrigerated upon opening, provided it is used within a reasonable length of time.
A lovely glow seems to emanate from every jar. You will also be glowing with grateful satisfaction while placing this "sunshine in a jar" on your pantry shelves.

We have canned over 75 pints of butter in the past year. Miles loves it and will open a jar when I'm not looking! I buy butter on sale, then keep it frozen until I have enough for canning 2 or 3 batches of a dozen jars each.

Source: http://www.endtimesreport.com/canning_butter.html

Belwether Notes:

The most difficult part of the whole process is coming up with the necessary extra funds to purchase the 11#'s of butter all at one time. I already had the jars. I used "Land-O-Lakes" unsalted.

Keep the temperature as low as possible yet let it simmer so as not to scorch the butter.

Shake, Shake, Shake and Shake some more - Looks good and tastes just fine.


Take Care - Belwether

13 comments:

Mayberry said...

Excellent! Thanks so much for the tip.

Degringolade said...

Great post. I love canning butter, I don't know why, but it soothes my soul.

I have found that the salted butter appears to hold up better than the unsalted. I had a bottle of unsalted butter go bad at 3 years and a bottle of salted still be good at 6 years.

Just kickin' my two cents in.

Unknown said...

Mayberry:

I did a second batch today - Have to have some for the neighbors - Must spread the joy...

Degringolade:

Wish I would have caught your "Salted vs Non Salted" tip before I started earlier this afternoon - Oh well - Always next batch - Thanks

riverwalker said...

Thanks belwether for the butter tips!

RW

Anonymous said...

I REALLY want to can butter. And I was already to use your recipe to can butter but I happened to found this article from the National Center for Home Food Preservation (www.uga.edu) that says they do not recommend canning butter because of the risk of Clostridium botulinum (that causes botulism). And I don't know what to do! I am REALLY wanting your or anyone's thoughts!

Shari said...

I canned 6lbs of butter today and was THRILLED with how easy it was and how beautiful the end result was. I used 3lbs of salted Land O Lakes and 3lbs of UNsalted Land O lakes. I am excited to try it out.

riverwalker said...

To: Jensen

It's a relatively safe process as long as you sterilize your jars and process it properly.

RW

riverwalker said...

To: Shari

Glad your results were OK! Thanks.

RW

Tammy said...

I had a couple of questions before i got started. I found a recipe to make homemade butter from scratch that i would like to do. Would it be okay to make to can if is made let settle then heat like you would store bought and then can? If anyone has any thoughts let me know something.thanks

Tammy said...

i had a couple of questions about canning butter. I found a recipe that is home made butter made from scratch. I want to can it but dont know how about going about it. Do you think it would be okay to make the home made butter, wait till it settles up then heat it like you would the store bought,then put in the jars to be canned. If anyone has any thoughts or answers email me at fairyteen_16@yahoo.com

babydually said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
babydually said...

Can honey butter be canned like this. If so, how much honey would I need to add? Thank you

Boerne Storage said...

Interesting tips, you got some great points on how to properly canned butter for storage.