Milk comes from cows. I got some milk from some cows not too far from here from a family friend. This family friend is embarking on a dairy farming adventure. There aren’t many cows being milked yet and the parlor isn’t quite ready so the milk goes into a giant metal milking bucket. Some of that milk made it into my mason jars. Some of it went to the new calves. I got to help by feeding one of the calves. As you can see, you must put the calf into a headlock while feeding.

We put the milk into the cooler with the beer we brought to drink while watching our friend milk the cows. I let the milk sit in the fridge for a day or two then carefully took some of the cream off the top. I ended up with about a pint. I researched making butter with a Kitchen aid mixer. Since I only had a pint it wasn’t really necessary to cover the mixer with plastic wrap. Had I 6 cups of cream, like the recipe called for, I image the buttermilk would have splashed all over. I got a bit over a golf ball sized ball of butter and about 1 1/2 cups buttermilk. The wine is apple-plum from my fruit trees and was for drinking while making butter.

With the buttermilk I made buttermilk biscuits, which was a first for me. I never have buttermilk on hand so usually make biscuits with regular milk and baking powder. I used the buttermilk that came from making the butter in the mixer for this. To go with this I made sausage gravy with milk from the cows that live not too far from here. I used the butter this weekend on my corn-on-the-cob which worked out perfectly since it was on the salty side. I haven’t bought milk at the store in over a week. I made butter, buttermilk, buttermilk biscuits (and gravy) and still have milk for other cooking adventures (like macaroni and cheese).

I don’t think any of the kids drank any milk in a glass but they did eat the biscuits and gravy. I love that I know exactly where this milk came from. I saw the milk come from the cow, then to the jar, then to my fridge. I love that I used so much of this milk for new cooking adventures. My next planned cooking adventure is making mozzarella cheese.

Good thing I have more wine in the basement.