I’ve had a very productive day today – not in the studio this time, but in the kitchen. If I’m not in my studio bent over the sewing machine, then I will be found in the kitchen conjuring up some culinary masterpiece (I wish!) for my family.

I cook from scratch pretty much all the time, so baking a couple of loaves was nothing new, but today I really went back to basics and decided to have a go at making the butter too.

I bought this gorgeous book through Country Living magazine (UK version) last year, as much for the lovely photography as for the content itself.

Butter has always been a little bit of an enigma for me and one of the few pre-packaged foods that I buy ready made. If I’m completely honest, making my own has been a scary prospect and shop bought butter (not spread/margarine) has very little in the way of additives so I’ve been happy enough to buy it until now.

The chapter on ‘Dairy’ has been thumbed through plenty of times, and the pictures make it look so simple that this morning I decided to take the plunge and make my own butter.

I have the requisite KitchenAid (in Pistachio Green, no less!) so beating the double cream to the stage where the liquid and solids separate took under a minute. Then it really was just a case of squeezing the butter under a cold running tap to get rid of as much buttermilk as possible and putting it in a dish in the fridge.

That’s it.

Virgin unsalted butter ready to use – amazing! The whole thing took less than five minutes; add another if you want to knead in a little salt to taste.

We tried it immediately on some olive bread that I made yesterday – delicious! And soooo quick and easy that, not only do I wonder why I have never tried before, but I will never buy ready made again. I just need to remember to keep a pot of double cream in the fridge at all times.

You can buy the book at Amazon UK. (I was not asked to review this book, it’s just so great I had to tell you about it:))

Ebay now, to try and find a pair of vintage butter pats and stamps…