Break Out the Slow Cooker for These Weeknight Dinners

Buttermilk Recipes

if you don't have a ready supply of buttermilk, you can make a quick substitution for buttermilk by souring some fresh milk. Add 1 tbsp of lemon juice to every 100ml of milk called for in the recipe. Stir the lemon juice into the milk and allow it to sit for 10-15 minutes until the milk has thickened and soured. You can usually also use plain yoghurt as a substitute, but may need to thin it down with some milk so that it is a pourable consistency.

How To Make Farmers Cheese With Buttermilk

This mild, creamy, multiuse cheese is simply great to have on hand. It's easy to make, easy to use, and easily one of my all-time favorite cheeses. Buttermilk gives it a slight tang, and the result is something between cream cheese and ricotta. Coagulation is swift and visually dramatic for this one, making it an impressive cheese to make with kids or for dinner guests (double the recipe for a crowd). The entire process is low-stress and gratifying, and takes about 30 minutes.

I love dipping garden-grown veggies in a dish of farmers cheese, but you can also use it for baking — or spreading on breakfast pastries. Alternatively, you can shape the cheese into a log and cover it with dry herbs for a lovely and delicious gift to bring to a party.

Find more tips for beginning your cheese-making journey in Cheese-Making Basics for Beginners.

Claudia Lucero is the entrepreneur behind Urban Cheesecraft and DIY Cheese Kits, and a frequent speaker at MOTHER EARTH NEWS FAIRS. This recipe is excerpted with permission from her book,One-Hour Cheese (Workman Publishing, 2017), available in the MOTHER EARTH NEWS Store.

The Best Buttermilk Substitutes You May Already Have In Your Kitchen

Dozens of iconic Southern recipes call for buttermilk, the incomparable cultured milk that lightens, tenderizes, marinates, flavors, and performs other works of kitchen magic. When buttermilk is at the heart of a recipe, should a cook turn to a substitute when the fridge is buttermilk-less? The answer is maybe, but only in a pinch.

Buttermilk adds more than liquid to a recipe. It's brimming with active cultures, similar to the good-for-us probiotics found in natural yogurt and sour cream. Those delicious tangy cultures are what enable buttermilk to work wonders in recipes, which means that liquid buttermilk should always be our first choice.

Related: 25 Recipes For Using Up Leftover Buttermilk

Caitlin Bensel; Food Stylist: Torie Cox

What Is Buttermilk?

Originally, buttermilk was the liquid by-product from churning butter. Because of how we make butter in the U.S. Today, most buttermilk found in stores is 'cultured buttermilk,' which comes from milk that has cultures added to it to simulate the naturally-occurring bacteria found in traditional buttermilk.

Buttermilk Substitutes

When buttermilk isn't available, the best substitute for buttermilk is another cultured dairy product, such as:

For all three, it may be necessary to thin with a little milk or cream if it's too thick to pour from a measuring cup.

What Not To Use As A Substitute

It's a shame that so many well-intentioned but misguided recipes encourage us to use milk curdled with lemon juice or vinegar as a replacement for buttermilk. That's bad advice, especially with skim milk and bottled lemon juice. Other than being acidic, curdled milk bears no resemblance to buttermilk, and it cannot deliver the goods. It's akin to rice cakes in lieu of hot biscuits, or, yes, water for chocolate.

Fred Hardy II; Food Stylist: Emily Nabors Hall; Props Stylist: Christina Brockman

Southern Buttermilk Pie

What About Dried Buttermilk Powder?

Dry powdered buttermilk can help with tenderness and browning in baked goods when whisked into the flour. It can also add tang to a recipe, akin to using a flavoring. But when reconstituted, it falls short of the real deal. It's comparable to instant coffee when you crave a freshly brewed cup.

Why You Should Always Keep Buttermilk On Hand

Some cooks are reluctant to buy buttermilk lest it go bad before it's used up. It's true that buttermilk eventually separates into solids and whey as it sits in the fridge, but if it comes back together when shaken, then it's fine to use, even if it's a few days past its expiration date.

Remember, buttermilk is already cultured and tangy, so a little age isn't a deal breaker. It can also be frozen.

Safekeeping and versatility are what made savvy Southern cooks fall in love with buttermilk in the first place, so it's wise keep it on hand. It can be used in all sorts of recipes and many of us like to drink it plain, so you're unlikely to have leftovers for long.

How To Make Buttermilk

But, wait, can a home cook learn how to make buttermilk? Yes, and it's easy, requiring little more than cream and a food processor. However, homemade buttermilk is the original, old-school by-product left from making butter, which is considerably different from store-bought, and might not be as successful in baked goods. But it's wonderful in most everything else.

Homemade Buttermilk Recipe

Frequently asked Questions

Can I substitute heavy cream for buttermilk?

The two are not interchangeable, especially in baking where the acidity of buttermilk (which heavy cream lacks) contributes to the rise and flavor of baked goods.

What happens if you use milk instead of buttermilk?

Again, these two ingredients aren't typically interchangeable, as milk is a much thinner product than buttermilk, and lacks the same acidity, both of which can impact the final recipe results, especially when baking.

Can I substitute sour cream for buttermilk?

Yes, although you'll likely want to thin it out with milk or water to achieve a buttermilk-like consistency.

Read the original article on Southern Living

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Break Out the Slow Cooker for These Weeknight Dinners