Homemade Sour Cream - EASY

[Marianne]

Right. And I'm taking a product that is already cultured and soured, adding it to fresh product to culture and sour. It's no different than using store purchase yogurt as a starter for homemade yogurt.

Obviously the homemade isn't going to have the shelf life as purchased sour cream. I haven't used cream or half & half, but from what I read, that will give you a thicker end result. I have been using whole milk. I end up with good, sour cream flavor and the consistency of thick salad dressing.

 

[~gd]

Right. And I'm taking a product that is already cultured and soured, adding it to fresh product to culture and sour. It's no different than using store purchase yogurt as a starter for homemade yogurt.

Obviously the homemade isn't going to have the shelf life as purchased sour cream. I haven't used cream or half & half, but from what I read, that will give you a thicker end result. I have been using whole milk. I end up with good, sour cream flavor and the consistency of thick salad dressing.

We are not really disagreeing I only mentioned the live culture BECAUSE NOT ALL SOUR CREAM OR YOGURT CONTAINS LIVE CULTURE.~GD

 

[Marianne]

What surprised me is that the purchased yogurt plainly states 'live' culture, but the sour cream tub doesn't say anything about it. But it's working. I'm on my 4th batch now. I use some of my previous batch for the next one. This last batch was on the counter for 36 hours, got a little stronger tasting and a little thicker.

Yogurt is the bigger money maker, more advertising, etc, That probably has something to do with it, too.

 

[Daffodils At The Sea]

This sounds great, thanks for posting it!

 

[Marianne]

Since I use milk, all I have made is 'sour cream' that has the consistency of thick salad dressing. So I use it a lot for that. Around here, if I buy the cream or half and half, I might as well buy the tub of sour cream (with preservatives).

One of these days, I'll post some salad dressing recipes that I like using the homemade sour cream.

And if I haven't said it before, welcome!

 

[Daffodils At The Sea]

Marianne, thanks. And I'd love to see the recipes *s*

 

[k15n1]

I am not a huge sour cream fan but I was under the impression that most is soured by adding acid. It would need to have a live culture for your method to work.

Sour cream is made with cultured milk fats, it must be alive enough to work. The sour cream made this way tastes just like what I buy. You also can make buttermilk using a bit of cultured buttermilk for a starter.

My understanding is that both types exist. I always check the label to make sure that a culture was listed in the ingredients.

 

[k15n1]

So you can make sour cream out of milk, half-and-half, or cream? Didn't know that. Well, if that's so, if you have excess dairy, you can make it into sour-cream based pie. All you need is sour cream, an egg or two, sugar, and a filling. I've had the best success with chopped and reconstituted dry fruits like apricots, golden rasins, and currants. I usually add walnuts, too.

 

[Britesea]

if you want a thicker sour cream, you could try draining it, just like if you were making greek-style yogurt.

I always add a little bit of buttermilk to my cream and culture it for about 8 hours at room temperature before I make butter. It comes together faster, tastes better, and if I don't get to it that day I can put it in the fridge and the raw cream doesn't develop any off flavor.

 

[Marianne]

That pie sounds really good, I don't think I've ever had anything like that!

Britesea, that's pretty interesting about adding buttermilk to the cream. I doubt if I'll ever get cream to make butter, but if I do, I hope I can remember this.
Culturing/fermenting for just 8 hours seems to make a big difference. I have read where people add a bit of whey to homemade mayo and let it sit on the counter for 8 hours before refrigerating. It's supposed to help the mayo keep longer in the frig.