Hashtags: #ButterStorage #SpreadableButter #ButterTips #KitchenHacks
If you’ve ever struggled with trying to spread hard butter on your toast or baked goods, you’re not alone. Finding the perfect balance of storing butter so that it’s spreadable every time can be a real challenge. But fear not! We’ve got some great tips and tricks to help you keep your butter just the way you like it.
### Why Butter Gets Hard in the Fridge
Before we dive into the solutions, let’s first understand why butter becomes hard when stored in the fridge. Butter is made up of milk fat and water. When it’s cold, the milk fat solidifies, causing the butter to harden. This is why it’s difficult to spread straight out of the fridge.
Now that we know why butter hardens in the fridge, let’s explore some ways to keep it spreadable without sacrificing its freshness.
### Tips for Storing Spreadable Butter
1. **Use a Butter Dish**: A butter dish with a lid can keep your butter at a consistent temperature, making it easier to spread. Just make sure to use it within a week to avoid spoilage.
2. **Room Temperature Butter Bell**: If you want to keep your butter at room temperature, consider using a butter bell or butter crock. These non-electric devices keep butter fresh and spreadable for up to 30 days.
3. **Butter Keeper**: A butter keeper is a small, lidded dish that holds a stick of butter. It can be left out on the countertop, and the water in the base creates an airtight seal to keep the butter fresh and spreadable.
4. **Covered Butter Tray**: If you prefer to keep your butter in the fridge but want it spreadable, try using a covered butter tray. This can help protect the butter from absorbing other food odors while keeping it soft and easy to spread.
### Different Types of Butter for Spreadability
Not all butter is created equal when it comes to spreadability. Here are a few examples of butter types that are naturally easier to spread:
1. **European Style Butter**: This type of butter is made from cream that has a higher fat content compared to regular butter. This makes it softer and more spreadable straight from the fridge.
2. **Whipped Butter**: Whipped butter contains air, which makes it lighter and easier to spread. However, keep in mind that whipped butter has a lower fat content, so it may not be the best choice for baking or cooking.
3. **Spreadable Butter with Oil**: Some brands offer spreadable butter products that are mixed with vegetable oils, making them easier to spread even when they’re cold.
### Additional Tips for Maintain Spreadable Butter
– **Store in an Airtight Container**: If you’re storing butter in the fridge, make sure to use an airtight container to prevent it from absorbing other food odors and keep it fresh.
– **Change Your Habits**: If you find that your butter is too hard, you can try changing your habits by taking the butter out of the fridge a few minutes before you need it to let it soften.
– **Grate Your Butter**: If you need softened butter for a recipe, try grating it. This increases the surface area, allowing it to soften more quickly.
**Conclusion**
By following these tips and considering different types of butter, you can find the perfect solution for storing your butter so that it’s spreadable every time. Whether you prefer to keep it in the fridge or at room temperature, there are plenty of options to ensure that you never struggle with hard butter again. With the right techniques and products, you can enjoy perfectly spreadable butter whenever you need it. So, say goodbye to the frustration of trying to spread hard butter and hello to delicious, easily spreadable goodness!
Butter doesn’t have to be kept in the refrigerator. You can store it on the counter and it should be easy to spread. Though it is recommended to only keep about two days worth out at a time.
I cut the amount needed for breakfast the night before and let it outside the fridge overnight, like this its room temperature when you eat it. Or if you toast your bread you can cut a piece and put it close to the toaster to slightly warm up without turning into oil
Get a butter dish and leave it out of the fridge. Trust me, it will change your life. Butter doesn’t go bad at room temperature and won’t melt unless you store it in a dumb place or your house is on fire.
Use a butter dish that blocks light (I.e. ceramic) and keep it in a cupboard.
There’s a thing called a Butter Bell. Uses a water seal to prevent oxidation. Works really well. Keep butter at room temp for a week or more.
All these people advising you to keep butter on the counter are missing an important aspect.
You can keep SALTED butter out on the counter for days. The salt preserves the butter from spoiling quickly, and makes it taste MUCH better when used as a spread rather than an ingredient.
Unsalted butter will go bad relatively quickly; use it as an ingredient in cooking, not as a spread. Unsalted butter has lasted for a couple of weeks in my house. Generally we go through two sticks in less time than that, so I’ve never had it go bad but once, when we left for a while. Unsalted butter will go bad far more quickly.
Lidl and Aldi store brand butter. I don’t know what makes it different, but it’s the most spreadable ever.
You can get a butter dish or just pop it into a Tupperware and leave it on the counter. I used to have a lovely butter dish, but my kids broke it within the first week of having it. So now it’s Tupperware.
Churn it and smoosh it around on a plate or in a bowl first and get it soft.
On the counter. In a butter bell.
Run the knife under hot water
i take mine and put in microwave for 14 seconds
Just soften it in the microwave. It takes like 10 seconds max and your butter won’t spoil after a week like it would in a butter dish.
Leave it on the counter.
There’s a thing called a buttermill that is sold. You can keep in fridge. When you need some, just crank it and it will shave the stick/dispense the butter. Life changer for me.
Get a butter dish and keep it somewhere that it doesn’t get hot enough to melt it.
We use about a stick a week of not more, so it spoiling isn’t an issue.
Just use a hot knife and it spreads ‘like a hot knife through butter’
Microwave for 10 seconds before spreading
Thanks me later
I just put mine in a butter dish on my kitchen counter…i probably use it up with in 2 weeks. Has never gone bad.
Use a grater!!! When you need butter to spread but also want to keep it in the fridge. Grate it.
if you use it every day then use those dishes with the lid and water. butter bell
works best with salted butter
if you use it infrequently and unplanned, then i don’t think there’s a solution for you.
We have a ceramic butter dish with a lid. It seems to regulate the butters temp well as it never melts and is firm enough to measure and lift.
Butter doesn’t melt at room temp – are you storing it near the stove or something? We leave ours out in a covered butter dish just like our families did all growing up.
If you take a fine mesh strainer and run it across the top of your cold butter, it will strain through and you’ll have ‘whipped’ butter! Your welcome.
For a few years now I have left butter out on the counter in a polished aluminum butter dish but just one stick at a time. In the summer it can get a little softer than I’d like & in the winter it needs a little work to spread but so far it has never gone off.
Also, just an opaque, airtight container is fine. Salted butter will keep at room temp for about 3 weeks.
we have a couple butter dishes, for standard sticks and the Irish butter. they don’t really go bad unless the butter isn’t used for months.
I blend 500g with 2 cups of olive oil, spreads straight from the fridge. Any oil will do but I like light olive.
Butter was common use in 8000bc.
When was the refrigerator invented.
Just leave it out.
Yeah, leave out one stick at a time, as everyone said, as long as it’s salted it will be fine, and the rest keep in the fridge until the room temp one needs to be replaced.
Also, when your butter goes bad, you’ll know it, you will easily be able to smell it has turned.
Use a zest grater on your cold butter
I have a “Better Dish” that I bought on impulse at a major US retailer for much cheaper than I could get it online. I use salted butter in it and it’s always the perfect consistency. My husband makes fun of me because I talk up our butter dish so much, but it really is fantastic! The lid flips up so you never have a dirty lid to set down and it’s also dishwasher safe.
If you ever need softened butter you can put the stick in the microwave with a small cup of water near it. Microwave it for 10-15s and it will be softened and not melted. Works for baking for for spreading. Just don’t forget the cup of water otherwise it will be melted in some spots and hard on others.
Nobody has said the trick for how to rapidly soften butter. Let’s say you need two sticks of butter for a cookie recipe, and you want to eat them in an hour. Recipes typically call for softened butter but you only have sticks in the fridge. You could try mixing solid butter with the dry mix, which you’ll quickly find is impossible. Or, you can microwave it and it will inevitable melt to liquid, and ruin the puffy texture of the cookies. Instead, try this little diddly. Pour near-boiling hot water into a *glass* mixing bowl, or *glass* 9×9 baking pan, so it fully heats up the glass. Discard water and place hot glass over the unwrapped butter on the counter. The radiant heat will soften it up evenly in just few minutes and you’ll be ready to roll.
Keep it in the top part of the door to your fridge. It’s the hottest part of your fridge.
Ah if only fridges still have those fancy butter boxes
Use Whipped Tub butter, leave on countertop, ready to do!
Don’t put it in the refrigerator.
Plus one for a butter bell. I live in the south of New Zealand so get cold and 8 months of the year a butter bell is good for spreadable butter. The other months a few seconds in the microwave on the soften butter setting and good to go.
Umm you just store it on the counter in a butter dish.
Buy a temperature controlled butter dish! Yes, the invention you didn’t need to know existed, exists!
https://alfille.co.uk