We go through a lot of sour cream in our house. I use if for tacos, potatoes, in casseroles and sauces. We make dips with it and it's a key ingredient in coffee cake and plum cake.
Sometimes, to save the expense and the kilojoules I replace it with MOO plain yoghurt and it works reasonably well. But that MOO yoghurt isn't sour cream. And so I add it to the shopping list and screw my nose up at the price as I put it in the trolley.
I've been experimenting with cheese making (and I'll have more on that later) and reading lots and lots about it. In the course of my reading I've come across quite a few methods for making real sour cream at home, and they all piqued my interest.
It's a good thing I have a patient family, who are very used to my experiments, because they've taste tested a few batches of sour cream over the last three weeks. Some of them we didn't bother even dipping a spoon in, they just didn't appeal at all. Others were a little runny, some were too sour. And then on Tuesday we chose The One.
It's thick and creamy, and sour without being face puckering. It holds it's shape beautifully on a potato and doesn't slide off a cracker when it's made into a dip.
Best of all it's the easiest one to make, using just two ingredients, both available at your local supermarket, and it doesn't need any special appliances (not even a thermometer).
To try this beautiful MOO Sour Cream you will need:
1 cup cream (thickened is fine if you use it, as is pure)
1/4 cup cultured buttermilk (MOO buttermilk won't work for this recipe)
A jar with a lid
Step 1. Sterilise your jar. Don't be tempted to skip this step, you don't want to get sick.
Step 2. Add the cream and the buttermilk to your jar.
Step 3. Put the lid on and shake, shake, shake to thoroughly mix the cream and buttermilk.
Step 4. Sit the jar on the bench for 24 hours.
That's it! After 24 hours you will have rich, thick and luscious sour cream to use for dipping, sauces, potatoes, whatever you normally use sour cream for.
I've mentioned the buttermilk. You will need to buy a cultured buttermilk and you'll find it in the dairy cabinet with the other milks. The smallest carton I could find was 600ml, which is way too much for this recipe. But don’t throw out the leftovers, freeze it in 1/4 cup lots in a ziplock bag and you'll have it next time you want to make sour cream.
The cost? Well 1 cup of cream costs $1.07 and a quarter cup of buttermilk is about 20c (using cream and buttermilk from Aldi) so you'll have about 300ml of sour cream for $1.27 - around the same price as buying it. Actually it's 2 cents cheaper than buying it from Aldi.
I think I'll keep on MOOing sour cream. I like the "homemade" aspect of it. We always have cream in the fridge so now if I know I'll need sour cream for a meal or a dip or cake I can pull a bag of buttermilk out of the freezer, thaw it in a jar, add the cream and then forget about it.
I guess it's up to you. If you can get cream at a reasonable price and you buy buttermilk anyway or are able to freeze the excess then why not make your own?
Would you bother to make sour cream? Or do you already MOO sour cream in your kitchen? Perhaps you have a better way of MOOing it? Leave your comments below :)
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great easy recipe
ReplyDeleteno wouldn't bother - I always have sour cream in the fridge - the coles one is nice and cheap - but I don't always have cream. I do like making things myself though! thanks for sharing it,
ReplyDeleteI do and it's hardly a bother - just add two things to a jar, shake and wait. Much prefer to only have to buy one thing that can do double or triple or quadruple duty than having to fill the trolley with a dozen ingredients that only do one thing. It's not always about the price though is it, but more about the experience and the skill learned/shared and being self-sufficient, living a more sustainable and less consumer based lifestyle.
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