Butter Factory Website

The past few months I have had another hat on, getting our website up and running. It is nearly finished, just a few more adjustments to the shopping cart and photos of produce to load up.

I have added a recipe search function to make it easy to find our butter and buttermilk recipes. Having them all in one place is a great resource. I will keep adding more as I write and test them.

I hope you don’t mind but I have added suscribers to our newsletter as I am not sure how often I can get back here to update.

Regards,

Naomi

Braised Shoulder of Goat marinated in Buttermilk

Buttermilk is perfect or marinating meats, the lactic acid helps to break down the protein and tenderise the meat. It also adds a lovely acidity to the sauce.

ingredients

• 500g Goat Shoulder
• 1 litre buttermilk
• 4 garlic cloves bruised
• 60ml EV olive oil
• 2 celery stalks, diced
• 2 small carrots, diced
• 1 onion, diced
• 1 tin crushed tomatoes
• 1 ¼ cups chicken stock
• 6 sprigs of thyme
• 2 fresh bay leaves
• 20g butter
• ½ cup green olives, pitted
• 2 tbsp chopped parsley
• 2 tbsp lemon zest
• soft polenta to serve

Method

1. Marinate Goat overnight in buttermilk with 2 garlic cloves & 2 thyme sprigs.
2. Preheat oven to 140 deg C
3. Remove meat from marinade, pat dry and season.
4. Heat oil in a casserole dish until hot, add the meat and turn occasionally until browned. Transfer to a dish to keep warm.
5. Add the vegetables to the casserole dish and sauté until starting to caramelise.
6. Add the tomatoes, stock, bay leaves and thyme and bring to the boil.
7. Return the meat to the dish, cover with baking paper and a lid. Bake in the oven until tender about 3 hours.
8. Remove goat from the sauce and slice.
9. Stir in butter and olives to the sauce.
10. Serve on soft polenta and garnish with lemon and parsley.

Buttermilk Soda Bread

We are pretty chuffed with the announcement of the Delicious Produce awards finalists recently and our nomination for our buttermilk. It is an exciting product, seeing as though it is the only true buttermilk available through retail outlets. The stuff you get at the supermarket in cartons is a ‘cultured skim milk product’ according to the label. Hopefully we in Australia will embrace it as much as our friends in Europe, India and North America have.

We make our own bread in the Factory cafe using buttermilk to add an extra lightness to the dough.

Buttermilk Soda Bread

Ingredients:
500 g all-purpose flour
50 g  sugar
5 g baking soda
10 g baking powder
3 g salt
115 g butter, softened
235 ml buttermilk
1 egg
55 g butter, melted
60 ml buttermilk

Method:
1. Preheat oven to 190 degrees C. Lightly grease a large
baking sheet.
2. In a large bowl, mix together flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder,
salt and softened butter. Stir in 1 cup of buttermilk and egg. Turn dough out
onto a lightly floured surface and knead slightly. Form dough into a
round and place on prepared baking sheet. In a small bowl, combine
melted butter with 1/4 cup buttermilk; brush loaf with this mixture. Use a
sharp knife to cut an ‘X’ into the top of the loaf.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 45 to 50 minutes, or until a skewer
inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean, about 30 to 50
minutes. You may continue to brush the loaf with the butter mixture
while it bakes.

Buttermilk Ricotta Hot Cakes with Chocolate butter

I have been working on some new flavoured butter for the launch of our butter club. I had an idea of making a decadent chocolate butter but not too sweet, I have tried out a few different chocolates and found Willies Indonesian chocolate gave me the best flavour and consistency. Bronwyn has used our buttermilk ricotta to make hot cakes to go with the chocolate butter as a new addition to our breakfast menu.

Hot Cakes with Myrtleford Chocolate butter

• 1 1/3 cups Buttermilk Ricotta
• ¾ cup Milk
• 4 Eggs separated
• 1 cup Plain Flour
• 1 teaspoon Baking powder
• 1 Pinch of Salt
• 50 g Butter
• Myrtleford Chocolate butter to serve
• Icing sugar for dusting

1. Place ricotta, milk and egg yolks in a mixing bowl and mix to combine.
2. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl.
3. Add to the ricotta mixture and mix until just combined.
4. Place egg whites in a clean dry bowl and beat until stiff peaks form.
5. Fold egg whites through batter in two batches, with a large metal spoon.
6. Lightly grease a large non-stick frying pan with a small portion of the butter and drop 2 tablespoons of batter per hotcake into the pan (don’t cook more than 3 per batch).
7. Cook over a low to medium heat for 2 minutes, or until hotcakes have golden undersides.
8. Turn hotcakes and cook on the other side until golden and cooked through.
9. Place on serving plate with chocolate butter and dust with icing sugar.

Baked Buttermilk Ricotta Gnocchi

One of the cafe menu favourites, we were using a ricotta from pecorino whey but now we are making our own from buttermilk I have worked the recipe to use this. Buttermilk ricotta has a lot more flavour than the traditional ricotta, it has a slight acidity rather than sweetness so it works really well in savoury applications. It made this gnocchi really light and fluffy, right to the end of the bowl.

Baked Ricotta Gnocchi

Ingredients

500g Buttermilk Ricotta

5 eggs

25g butter melted

1/3 grated parmesan

salt & pepper

mixed chopped fresh herbs like parsley, oregano and basil

350g plain flour sifted

Method

1. In a blender place ricotta, slowly add eggs and melted butter.

2. Place ricotta egg mix in a large bowl and fold in parmesan, salt, pepper, herbs and flour.

3. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours or overnight.

4. Place a large pot of water on stove top and bring to boil.

5. roll the dough into logs, with a little extra flour, the width of your thumb and cut into 2cm lengths.

6. place these into the boiling water and cook until they float to the surface.

7. put the risen gnocchi into ice water to cool quickly and set aside.

Make a sauce by reducing a splash of white wine and pouring cream. Place gnocchi into a oven proof dish and pour over sauce. Sprinkle with parmesan and place in oven to bake until golden.

You can also use a tomato based sauce with bocconcini.

Easter

Hi,

Easter is nearly here, and it is one of the busiest holidays on our calender.

Opening Times Good Friday – Monday 8:30am to 5pm, we are closed on Tuesday and Wednesday.

If you are thinking of coming in, I would advise booking your table in advance.

Happy, safe travels to all our friends. Enjoy the break and we look forward to seeing you soon.

Naomi

Slow Roast Pork Belly on a heirloom bean & tangelo salad with buttermilk dressing

Pork has to be one of my favourite meats and the acidity of the buttermilk dressing complements pork really well. Inspired by a recipe from Ottelenghi, its become one of the most popular dishes on the menu.

Ingredients

Pork

1 bunch of Thyme, roughly chopped

1 bunch of rosemary, roughly chopped

1 head of garlic, cloves peeled and crushed

150ml olive oil

1 piece of pork belly, about 2 – 3 kg

1 bottle white wine

Salt and pepper

Method

1. Heat your oven to 250 Deg C. Place the herbs, olive oil and garlic in a food processor and roughly puree.
2. Lay the pork belly in an oven tray, skin side down, and season lightly with salt and pepper. Rub in the herb mixture evenly over the meat.
3. Turn the belly skin-side up, pat the skin dry with some kitchen paper and sprinkle salt evenly over the skin, not too thick though.
4. Put the tray in the oven to roast for 1 hour. Once some crackling has formed on the skin, turn the oven down to 170 deg C and pour the white wine into the tray (avoiding the skin) and roast for another hour. If the belly start turning black cover with foil.
5. For the final stage, turn the oven down to 110 deg C and continue roasting for another hour until the skin is completely crackled and dry.
6. Serve with a salad of blanched beans, mixed cherry tomatoes and tangelo wedges dressed with the buttermilk dressing.

Buttermilk Dressing

• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• 2 tblsp sour cream
• 2 tblsp cider vinegar
• 2 tblsp finely chopped shallot
• 1 tblsp sugar
• 3 tblsp finely chopped chives
• 1 tblsp chopped tarragon
• salt and pepper

Whisk all ingredients together until sugar has dissolved.