Help! Blended butter and water, now won't separate.

[SpaceMonkey23]

Hi. Can anyone help me, please? 

 

I made a very small batch of cannabutter yesterday. I used the following proportions: 

 

5g - Leafy bud

100g - Butter

350g - Water

 

I cooked it all in a pressure cooker for an hour, and at the end I did a stupid thing and used an immersion blender (ie. stick blender or bamix) to blend the mixture up. I thought this would break the leaves up and allow the maximum exposure of the cannabinoids to the butter. 

 

After blending, the mixture looked like a runny yellow cream. I put it in the fridge overnight, and it hasn't separated! There is a mushy layer of butter on the top, but it's not hard like it should be (more like cream on a jar of milk), and furthermore the rest of the mixture is very milky looking, so I think that I may have formed an emulsion when I blended it (the mixture was hot at the time, probably around 75-80C). 

 

Does anybody know what I can do to salvage this? I tried reboiling and then putting it into the freezer (just a stab in the dark!). It seems to be separating out again, but still looks like it won't fully separate. 

 

Will get a pic up in a short while. 

 

Any suggestions? Thanks all for your time. 

[merl1n]

DOH!!

Oh Shit, don't be doing that again

Biff and start again, would be my advise

[SpaceMonkey23]

Biff and start again, would be my advise

 

That would really bug me, throwing away good bud on an emulsion that won't separate when I've had loads of failed hollandaise and mayonnaise (ie. emulsion) sauces fuck up on me over the years because I couldn't make the emulsion stable! It's like some sort of cosmic mockery or something! 

[The Stoned Jester]

evaporate the milky white liquid / extract as much water as possible then use it to bake a cake / muffins or something.

Edited February 24, 2014 by The Stoned Jester

[Lenore]

One thing I'm not clear on is have you taken out the plant matter?

If not, this will cause half the problem you are explaining.

Last time I made butter, I couldn't finish the process. So I put the lot in the fridge (after cooling) couple of days later I thought, I'd be smart and just lift off the solidified butter on top.
Ah, nope.
While the butter had set, it had set all thru the pot green stinky goodness, on the plant matter.

So I had to reheat and then remove the plant matter. Then it was as good as any run.

[Naycha]

Agree with Lenore, try reheating perhaps adding more water.

 

Naycha

[louise]

Really shouldn't be too hard to save, when you make regular butter from scratch (ie from creamy milk) it forms an emulsion which you then 'pat' with a pair of wooden pats to push out the last of the butter milk and form it into a solid block of butter fat.

 

Example of traditional butter working tools...

 

The grooves in the pats assist the release of butter milk, but if you don't have butter pats a couple of chilled wooden spoons and a wooden board will do...

 

The butter needs to be firm enough that it isn't smearing onto the board or spoons, but pliable enough to shape when you pat it with the spoon.

 

Place the board on a firm surface, add the butter to the centre of the board and then gently tap the top and sides of the butter to compress it into a block.

 

As the butter is compressed you will see droplets of water form on the surfaces which can then be drained away. If the butter softens too much, chill the whole lot in the fridge for a few minutes and then continue.

 

All the best with it... shouldn't take more than a few minutes working the butter to squeeze out the remaining water.

[louise]

reading back over your post... if the butter isn't firm enough to drop it onto a board you'll need to remelt. The best way I know to break an emulsion is to add more water. If you put the butter into a large bowl and then pour boiling water over the top you should be able to melt it completely. Then chill until cool and follow the above post to remove the remaining fluid.

 

edit... the boiling water will work better if it is very salty.

Edited February 25, 2014 by louise

[SpaceMonkey23]

Thanks so much for your advice, everyone. I tried reheating it and it didn't seem to break the emulsion, so I just said 'fuck it' and boiled all the moisture away. I ended up with the pure butterfat with some extra green sludge at the bottom. The butterfat tastes very bitter, which may be the result of the boiling down. Mind you, the butterfat has a good smooth texture, so it doesn't seem like it will require the working as you've suggested Louise (I'll remember that for future, though - thanks.)

 

What I actually did with the butterfat is to mix it with some icing sugar and very good quality cocoa powder, and basically made little chocolate drops! Here's a photo of them in an ice cube tray in the fridge:

 

photo.bmp

 

As you can see, there's a nice gloss to them, so I guess boiling the mixture down has provided good enough purity.

 

I'll be eating one of those tomorrow. Can't wait!

 

Thanks again for your input, people.

[louise]

No worries Monkey, a suggestion for next time... washing the butter improves the taste mightily... my butter thread in the cooking forum outlines the method. Washing takes it from something that needs to be drowned in sugar and chocolate or coffee to something you can spread on toast and eat it without any fear of gagging.