Another Easy Peasy Homemade Probiotic: How to Make Sour Cream

I want to talk about making sour cream today, but before I can start talking about that, let's look at the creamline on these containers of milk:

THAT, my friend, is a bee-YOU-tiful sight!

I took these pictures several months ago, and this post has been languishing in "draft" mode ever since. We are currently in a period where we don't have access to raw milk.  The cow that we get milk from is dry, getting ready to deliver again in April.

And after looking at these beautiful pictures again, I'm trying not to cry over spilt no milk...






Back to sour cream....

...homemade sour cream so rich, and thick and creamy...it will hold a spoon straight up in the air.



I'd never made sour cream before a few months ago.  We'd just started the GAPS protocol, and when we were able to add fermented dairy back in, we couldn't have store-bought sour cream, only homemade sour cream  Just take a look at the ingredients list on store-bought sour cream to understand why this would be.

Commercially produced sour cream often contains additional thickening agents such as gelatin, rennet, guar and carrageen, as well as acids to artificially sour the product.  Light, or reduced-fat, sour cream contains about 40 percent less butterfat than regular sour cream because it is made from a mixture of milk and cream rather than just cream. Fat-free "sour cream" contains no cream at all, and is made primarily from non-fat milk, modified cornstarch, thickeners and flavoring agents. (source)

This homemade sour cream contains two ingredients:

cream
kefir

And in case you're sitting there ready to write this off because it contains cream - a.k.a. dreaded "fat" - listen to this:  we need fat.  This was a news flash for me several years ago.  You mean I didn't have to fear fat?  I'd been buying fat-free everything I could for 15 years.  This was a major mind-shift for me.  

When we first started GAPS, I read in the book that homemade sour cream had a "beautiful fatty lipids profile" and made an excellent snack with berries or honey drizzled in it.  That sounded disgusting to me.

But a week or so into GAPS I changed my tune: one night I wanted something to eat as a bedtime snack, and I finally tried the book's suggestion of sour cream with honey drizzle.  That was all she wrote.  I was hooked with a capital H.  

My favorite thing to eat on GAPS has been this sour cream.  In fact, you can ask my family - I don't share this with them.  I love all these peeps here in my  house - no doubt about it - but keep. your hands. off. my sour cream.  I've been known to polish off a pint of this stuff all by myself in just one day.  And a few times...I've eaten more than a pint in one day.

And I've lost almost 20 pounds now.  

Yes, eating straight fat like it's going out of style.  

Lost almost 20 pounds. 

I still can't believe that is true.  God is good, and I love the way He works.  We are truly fearfully and wonderfully made....and things work best when we go along with the way He planned things (He put fat in milk for a reason!).  

So, back to the sour cream recipe.


Here are my ingredients below, Kefir on the left, cream in the pint jars. I just skim some of the cream off the top of our raw milk (I don't skim all of it off the milk....heavens, NO! I do not want skim milk, it's not good for us)...but you could always buy some organic cream from the store.  

For each pint of cream, mix in 1/4 c. kefir...and give it a good stir.

I then put the lids on my jars and leave them out on the counter for at least 24 hours.  When it is colder, it will take longer for the cream to culture.  If it is still liquid-y, it needs to culture for longer.  

What I have been doing the past couple of months since it's been colder, is to put my jars by my 7-qt crockpot that is humming away on my counter 24/7 with homemade broth...to give it some added warmth to help with the culturing process.  

While I've never messed with this method, I've also read that you can put your jars in your Excalibur dehydrator (with all the trays taken out, of course)...to keep them at a warm and constant temp to facilitate culturing.  

After they're done culturing...put them in the fridge, where they will continue to thicken up even more.  

Use it as a topping on dishes, stir into soup...or just drizzle some honey on and go to town.

Seriously, this stuff is so good.