Well, Well, Well.

[1 bruce 1]

A few days ago I made butter.
I keep it in the fridge.
I had what would amount to a half a stick left, and forgot it, and left it on the counter.
The butter is now gone.

Q: Who do you think is the butter thief?

A: The one that will surely try to hide their case of Explosive Rear End tomorrow.

I won't be able to say "I caught you red handed" but I'll be happy to say "Caught you squatty-butted"...

 

[Norachan]

Wow, you made your own butter! I feel very proud of myself if I make my own toast.

 

[1 bruce 1]

Wow, you made your own butter! I feel very proud of myself if I make my own toast.

Some days I almost burn iced tea. Butter making is very simple to do!
I'd suspect Baby Girl but she isn't a counter cat, but Queen Bee's Brother is. He's looking a little "full".
Now I'm worried about pancreatitis. Freaking cats.

 

[Margret]

Does butter contribute to pancreatitis? I'd never heard that one!

When I was a kid we had an electric ice cream machine that my dad was very proud of. It has an outer container in which you put large grained salt and ice and ice water (the water means that there's total contact with the inner chamber where the ice cream is made, the ice keeps the water cold, and the salt keeps the water from totally freezing), an inner chamber where you put the ingredients of the ice cream, and a couple of paddles that go into the inner chamber. The paddles are attached to a metal thing that clamps on to the top and contains the machinery that makes the paddles rotate, both on their own axes and around the center of the chamber, keeping the freezing ice cream continually mixed so that it freezes evenly.

So my dad would make ice cream, which we would eat, but there was always a bit of something lard-like in the ice cream. We would complain, and my mother would hush us. I was fully adult before I finally figured it out - my dad was using full cream in his recipe, not even half-n-half, and those paddles were churning the cream and making unsalted butter in our ice cream. My mother knew how important this was to my dad and didn't want us to burst his bubble by complaining about the butter.

When the house was sold, decades after the demise of the ice cream maker, there were still giant salt crystals scattered around the garage.

Margret

 

[1 bruce 1]

Does butter contribute to pancreatitis? I'd never heard that one!

When I was a kid we had an electric ice cream machine that my dad was very proud of. It has an outer container in which you put large grained salt and ice and ice water (the water means that there's total contact with the inner chamber where the ice cream is made, the ice keeps the water cold, and the salt keeps the water from totally freezing), an inner chamber where you put the ingredients of the ice cream, and a couple of paddles that go into the inner chamber. The paddles are attached to a metal thing that clamps on to the top and contains the machinery that makes the paddles rotate, both on their own axes and around the center of the chamber, keeping the freezing ice cream continually mixed so that it freezes evenly.

So my dad would make ice cream, which we would eat, but there was always a bit of something lard-like in the ice cream. We would complain, and my mother would hush us. I was fully adult before I finally figured it out - my dad was using full cream in his recipe, not even half-n-half, and those paddles were churning the cream and making unsalted butter in our ice cream. My mother knew how important this was to my dad and didn't want us to burst his bubble by complaining about the butter.

That house was sold decades after the demise of the ice cream maker, and when it was there were still giant salt crystals scattered around the garage.

Margret

I've heard mixed things. From what I remember, pancreatitis can sometimes be acute in animals that have a predisposition if they consume a very fatty meal.
This little bro has never had a problem eating fatty foods (he loves cream, loves this fatty beef trim). Vet told me once that the more we know, the more paranoid we get, and I am finding out how true that is.
I think he'll be fine, but I just want to watch them all. I don't know why they do this. It's like they love my gray hair getting grayer.
That's a great memory of that ice cream maker. Sometimes we remember stuff and aren't sure why, but it leaves some imprint on us and it just makes us smile and remember the good old days. I have memories that will relax me and make me laugh, when I feel like my tops about to blow.

 

[Margret]

Except for my lost decade I have an excellent memory. Never been good at memorizing, but memories? No problem, and since I had good parents and a happy childhood most of my memories are pleasant ones. And, oddly, after the brain tumor was removed I began to be better at memorizing, too. Weird.

Margret

 

[Willowy]

I've heard that fat intake can cause acute pancreatitis in dogs, but cats handle fat better and the cause of pancreatitis in cats is unknown. . .dang cats have to be mysterious!

My co-worker has a very funny story involving his Mini Poodle and a pound of cheddar cheese. And the dog went into the bathtub to explode, as he was a good doggie and didn't want to soil the carpet, but then he couldn't get out of the tub, and scrabbled in the poop, and. . .well, you sort of have to be there when he's telling it!

 

[MoochNNoodles]

Whoops!

One of my dogs growing up was notorious for eating stuff on us. My mother said she had a cast-iron stomach because it never phased her. I mean she literally got into my step-sister's bedroom and stole an entire bag of Hershey kisses and ate them wrappers and all. We found out when she left shiny deposits around the yard... But she was fine. She lived to be 14.

 

[DreamerRose]

When I was a kid we had an electric ice cream machine that my dad was very proud of. It has an outer container in which you put large grained salt and ice and ice water (the water means that there's total contact with the inner chamber where the ice cream is made, the ice keeps the water cold, and the salt keeps the water from totally freezing), an inner chamber where you put the ingredients of the ice cream, and a couple of paddles that go into the inner chamber. The paddles are attached to a metal thing that clamps on to the top and contains the machinery that makes the paddles rotate, both on their own axes and around the center of the chamber, keeping the freezing ice cream continually mixed so that it freezes evenly.

So my dad would make ice cream, which we would eat, but there was always a bit of something lard-like in the ice cream. We would complain, and my mother would hush us. I was fully adult before I finally figured it out - my dad was using full cream in his recipe, not even half-n-half, and those paddles were churning the cream and making unsalted butter in our ice cream. My mother knew how important this was to my dad and didn't want us to burst his bubble by complaining about the butter.

That house was sold decades after the demise of the ice cream maker, and when it was there were still giant salt crystals scattered around the garage.

Margret

I still have one of those. It's not that old either, and it's electric too so you don't have to crank it. It makes delicious ice cream, but no butter. I have made butter, though, when I beat whipping cream too long without adding any sugar. That's easy to do. I think churning milk for butter didn't take as long as everyone thinks.

 

[Margret]

Yep, we've accidentally made butter from whipping cream as well. It's very easy to do.

I'm guessing you don't put cream in your ice cream maker - that was where my dad went wrong. All of the mistakes that I remember him making were along those lines, well-intentioned but falling afoul of something he didn't understand. When he got us ice skates, for instance, he neglected to have the blades sharpened because he didn't understand the need and he worried about sharp blades near the hands of his children. The result was that the skates didn't glide across the ice, they stuck, resulting in a lot of falls. That was another one that I didn't understand until I was fully grown. I wish I'd told my mother about it at the time; she would have figured out the cause and quietly taken the skates in for sharpening.

Margret

 

[DreamerRose]

I haven't made ice cream in years, but I have a wonderful recipe for buttered pecan. I made a custard first, and it probably had some amount of cream in it, maybe half and half. But not pure cream.

 

[Winchester]

When Bootser came into the house, I quickly learned to store butter in the microwave when I wanted to soften it for baking. (I also learned to keep bread and buns in the microwave for storage, but that's another story.) One night I put butter out on the counter to soften. When I got up and came out to the kitchen the next morning, all that was left was the wrapper. I called the vet and she said to keep an eye on Bootser for the "explosion" but that she should be fine. And she was. My fault. I should have known better. Bootser lived to be 21 years old, so the butter didn't do much damage. Nor did chewing on the plastic bags to get into the bread and buns.

Dad used to make ice cream often for us during the winter. He had an old crank-type ice cream freezer and we used to have to take turns cranking. He figured out how to convert it to an electric freezer, which made everything much easier. Mom would make a custard, then throw it into the ice cream freezer. And Dad always got to eat from the paddles. We loved ice cream nights. We bought them a huge White Mountain ice cream freezer one year for Christmas. When they down-sized, they gave it back to us and we still have it. But we've never been able to find that old ice cream freezer that he converted years and years ago; we think Mom probably sold it. But when the family gets together, we still talk about that old ice cream freezer and the tons of ice cream that it made.

Memories. Thanks 1 bruce 1 .

 

[mightyboosh]

Who do you think is the butter thief?

A cat would never do such a thing, they're too honest and law abiding.
It must have been a human burglar or some wild animal that wandered in.

 

[DreamerRose]

I like soft butter, so I bought a covered butter dish that I leave on the counter. Haven't had any problems since. After Lily opened a bag of bagels and ate a jalapeno bagel, I bought a bread box for bread items. I really didn't want it because it takes up so much space on the counter, but I had no choice.

 

[Margret]

I like soft butter, so I bought a covered butter dish that I leave on the counter. Haven't had any problems since.

I did the same, but then I gave up on it, started buying whipped butter in tubs. I still leave it out to get soft and haven't had any problems either with it going rancid or melting, and it's very easy to keep covered. The only reason I buy stick butter now is if I need it for baking, because it's easy to measure.

After Lily opened a bag of bagels and ate a jalapeno bagel, I bought a bread box for bread items. I really didn't want it because it takes up so much space on the counter, but I had no choice.

Jalapeño?! Wow!!!

Bright Eyes is another cat who loves bread and is quite willing to break into the bag to get at it. But I tend to have 3 different loaves at once, and don't have enough counter space for a bread box, so I'm about to try to find one of those plastic latches you can install on cabinets when you're trying to child proof a house.

Margret

 

[1 bruce 1]

I really like these memories and fun stories this thread has opened up.
I'm also relieved to know I'm not the only one with little thieves.

Guess what. It was Queen Bee AND her brother. No one has an exploding butt, but it's...leakier than normal.
If the others joined in, they didn't get much, or are so good at stealing food that it doesn't upset their stomachs anymore.

...Does this mean we are sheltering a pack of...

.......CAT burglars?

 

[Margret]

Cats have no sense of shame (yet somehow they instinctively know exactly how to make humans feel guilty), which makes them naturals when it comes to theft. They're also into lying - "Oh, I'm so hungry! You're the only one who ever feeds me," (to a person who comes once a week and never feeds the cat), and "Oh, I'm so abused! No one else ever scratches the good spots, or plays with me, or lets me lie on their laps." And let's not forget that old favorite - "I meant to do that," after falling off of the sofa.

Margret

 

[1 bruce 1]

I've heard that fat intake can cause acute pancreatitis in dogs, but cats handle fat better and the cause of pancreatitis in cats is unknown. . .dang cats have to be mysterious!

My co-worker has a very funny story involving his Mini Poodle and a pound of cheddar cheese. And the dog went into the bathtub to explode, as he was a good doggie and didn't want to soil the carpet, but then he couldn't get out of the tub, and scrabbled in the poop, and. . .well, you sort of have to be there when he's telling it!

I shouldn't laugh but I can't help it, that's hilarious but that poor little Poodle stuck in the tub! (He went INTO the bathtub on his own? That's a smart dog!)

 

[1 bruce 1]

Cats have no sense of shame (yet somehow they instinctively know exactly how to make humans feel guilty), which makes them naturals when it comes to theft. They're also into lying - "Oh, I'm so hungry! You're the only one who ever feeds me," (to a person who comes once a week and never feeds the cat), and "Oh, I'm so abused! No one else ever scratches the good spots, or plays with me, or lets me lie on their laps." And let's not forget that old favorite - "I meant to do that," after falling off of the sofa.

Margret

And they take it one step further...they MEANT to do that, and stayed up half the night practicing their physical comedy so we have a reason to smile, and aren't we lucky?