separating cream

[thelendleys]

Can you tell me the best way to separate cream from milk. I have been using sun tea jars but they are leaking all over my fridge. The milk I have has already been chilled.

thanks,
Brandy

[darbyfamily]

from all I've read and learned second hand, if you just let it sit in the fridge for 12-24 hrs you should be able to skim it off the top.. I'd heard that those tea jars were very very hard to get clean enough to avoid risk of bacteria...

[Eunice]

Any good glass jar should do for the milk to be cooled and let the cream rise. Gallon pickle jars are good if you can get the pickle smell out of the lid. I have an electric cream separator in the shed that has never been used. To me it is more work to clean than it would be worth in separating the cream. And then my husband would expect me to make butter on top of all the real necessities of life.

[darbyfamily]

Eunice, someone told me if you'll put a cut potato in the pickle jar and turn it upside down so the potato is sitting on the lid, it will help to get the pickle smell out. I've not tried it yet, but I need to, as I have about 4 gallon jars in the pantry waiting for milking that need to be 'depickleified' LOL

[earlyriser44]

For what it's worth:

We always had a milk cow when I was growing up. We used pickle jars because they were free and easy to get. We always put warm water and bakind soda in them, turned 'em upside down over night and the pickle smell was gone in the morning.

As for cream separating, just let it rise, skim it off with a ladle. If a little bit rises again just stir it in. That's what we've always done.

[jerzeygurl]

I pour the milk from the bucket to a large stock pot(stainless) and let set in fridge 12-24 hours, cream scoops right off...

[francismilker]

If you can find one of those gallon jars for making sun tea that has the plastic built in spiggot in the bottom for draining tea out, you can pour your whole milk in, let it separate, and then just drain the milk out of the bottom. The cream will stay in the jar because it was on top.

[Jennifer L.]

The easiest way to get cream is to skim it off the top. I put the milk in a pail and let it sit overnight, then take a soup ladle and skim it in the morning. You'll get most of it, and the amount you have to leave is going to be minimal. Milk that has been in a bulk tank (if you are getting this from a dairy farm) never separates as easily as it does if you get it straight from the cow. I don't know if it's the cooling (probably) or the agitation that starts a partial homogenization, but that cream always rises slower and not as nicely as the milk that was not treated that way.

Jennifer