Never run out of buttermilk again! Culturing buttermilk at home is as easy as can be. (And the end result is totally different than mixing cider vinegar or lemon juice with milk and letting it sour.)
Okay. Ready? If you blink, you’ll miss how to do it.
Pour buttermilk (1/4 cup for a quart jar or 1/2 cup for a half gallon jar) into your clean jar. Top off the jar with your plain milk. Tightly screw the lid to the jar and shake vigorously for 1 minute. Place in a warm (but not hot) area out of direct sunlight. Let it sit there for 12 to 24 hours, until thickened. Refrigerate when thick. Use within two weeks.
If you re-culture this regularly, you can carry on re-culturing indefinitely. I always feel like I’m stickin’ it to the man when I do homemade stuff like this. Who doesn’t love beating the system?
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i love it! cheap! easy! ive used it in all the things i make with buttermilk and so far so good
Perfect buttermilk – thick and creamy and with a great tangy flavor. I used whole milk. I’m just about to make my second batch building on my first!
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DBaley on 10.23.2020
Growing up in the South with real buttermilk after making fresh butter, then later being able to buy cultured buttermilk in the store when needed, then moving to Scotland almost 40 years ago all of a sudden buttermilk was nigh on impossible to source! The last 20 years the stores started selling small 300ml containers of buttermilk but as I use quite a bit each week for many of my baking and bread recipes in addition as a marinade for poultry it got a unwieldy and expensive. Never been a fan of soured milk ie adding lemon or vinegar to milk as not the same! About 5 years ago ran across a similar recipe as above (with the addition of 1 ingredient.
Sterilise your glass jar first
8 oz buttermilk
2 oz heavy/double cream
22 oz full fat milk
Give it a stir, cover with cheesecloth secured with a rubber band and leave out in kitchen as the recipe above details. When it thickens and gets that great buttermilk fragrance remove cheesecloth and screw on lid and stick in fridge. I go thru 2 to 3 of these a week(especially now with Covid-19 and making care packages for friends and family).
Mel on 10.11.2014
This is more of a question than a comment. I just tried your recipe and the resulting buttermilk tasted like liquid sour cream while the original buttermilk I started from had a tangier flavor. Is this correct? I started with a quart a live culture buttermilk that was super thick and waited until I had about 1/4 cup left. I didn’t have a large enough mason jar so I split that up into 2 pint size jars, about 3 tbsp. in each. I topped them off with regular store bought whole milk, put the lids on, shook them up well and set them on the counter that night. It’s a little chilly here so the next day I set them next to the crockpot that I was cooking dinner in and when I got home, the buttermilk had solidified into a solid mass with a diameter slightly smaller than the jar. There was a small amount of liquid left in each. I shook them up and opened them. It was the right consistency, very thick and creamy but the flavor wasn’t as strong as the original buttermilk. If I used a higher buttermilk to milk ratio would the flavor be stronger? Also will the flavor continue to decrease as I make more batches? Thanks in advance. Even with the milder flavor, I loved making this and will hopefully avoid ever buying buttermilk again. Thanks for a great recipe!
Juanita on 4.7.2011
Just mixed up a batch. I’m so excited! Can’t wait to have an unlimited amount of buttermilk in the refrigerator!
pinelopakee on 12.21.2010
So, i live in Greece and there is no buttermilk (or sour cream) here. I always substitute the things i don’t have in recipes but is there a way to make buttermilk without having to use buttermilk???
Chaney D. on 9.25.2010
This should be called never-ending buttermilk because that’s really what it is. I used it to make biscuits this morning and they were OH SO YUMMY! To anyone that thinks that Vinegar and Milk will make something that can even compare to this – you are wrong! I made this with buttermilk and a box of UHT 1% Milk I have in my pantry and it worked great!