Homemade Creme fraiche didnt work

12 years ago

Homemade Creme fraiche that I tried to make last night didnt get thick. I used 1 1/2 cups of heavy cream and made homemade buttermilk with 1/2 cup milk and 2 Tbs. lemon juice. Put into large glass jar, covered with cheese cloth.

Set it in a warm room with the shelf of grow lights for the hosta seedlings. It set for 14 hrs. not really much thicker than when I put it together. Does it need to set longer? Could I add more lemon juice as maybe it doesnt have enough acid in it?

Question is, can I use this mixture for anything else now (such as for scones, etc) now that the mix has set out all night, or is the mix now spoiled? Dont have time to make anything right away so wondering how long it would keep in the fridg.

Next time I would use buttermilk from the store, but we dont use buttermilk for anything else so it would seem a waste to buy.

Had planned on using the Homemade Creme fraiche for cheese cake at our dinner for 10 this weekend.

Bruce is making smoked prime rib!

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Comments (7)

cloudy_christine
12 years ago
You didn't really have buttermilk. Milk-plus-lemon-juice works as a substitute for buttermilk in baking -- you get soured milk which can react with baking soda. But what you need to make crÃ¨me fraiche is the bacterial culture that's in real buttermilk.
lindac
12 years ago
Yes.....what cloudy said.
I can buy half pint of buttermilk for about $.35 at Hy vee....it's A and E. You should be able to get it too.
Linda C
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grainlady_ks
12 years ago
I agree with cloudy christine - you lacked live bacteria (aka cultures) for fermentation found in buttermilk. You can use reconstituted powdered buttermilk for this purpose if you don't want to purchase liquid buttermilk. Plain yogurt (with live cultures) would also work as a source for live bacteria necessary.

If you try again, you might want to use your oven with the light on for a more constant temperature, and the temperature needs to be around 80-degrees F for this type of fermentation. Be sure to give the oven about 30-minutes to warm-up and take the temperature at several spots in the oven. My "best" temperature is usually as far from the light as possible.

-Grainlady
trudy_gw
Original Author
12 years ago
Thanks for your responses! Guess you cant believe every recipe you see on the internet, as the recipe was one that stated used homemade buttermilk.

Was a silly mistake, that I could of fixed by spending .35.

The room is 80 with the grow lights, so heat I dont think was an issue.

Thanks so much for your replies!
Chi
12 years ago
Has anyone successfully frozen buttermilk? I can only find quarts of buttermilk for $4 where I live, and usually I only need a cup or so for baking. The rest usually goes bad before I can use it so it would be nice if I could freeze it, but I'm not sure what kind of effect that would have.
olga_6b
12 years ago
The recipe is not necessary wrong. You can make homemade buttermilk using bacterial culture. This buttermilk would work in this recipe. The problem is that you used acidified milk, not homemade buttermilk. Acidified milk can substitute buttermilk in some recipes where it is used to provide acidity. In the case of this recipe the purpose of buttermilk was to provide bacteria, not acid.
Olga
Bumblebeez SC Zone 7
12 years ago
I keep buttermilk for months in the refrigerator and have used it 2 months past the expiration date and lived to write this. And, whatever I made with it tasted good!
Give it a good shake and it's fine.

Homemade Creme fraiche didnt work

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Homemade Creme fraiche didnt work

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cloudy_christine

lindac

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