Questions tagged [butter]
A dairy product made by churning milk to separate the butterfat from other milk components. Questions may involve butter either as an ingredient or as a final dish.
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Is it safe to leave butter at room temperature?
Is it safe to leave butter at room temperature? If so, for how long is it safe to keep it out?
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What is the purpose of creaming butter with sugar in cookie recipes?
I got distracted while assembling the dry ingredients for a cookie recipe and added the sugars, which were supposed to be creamed with the butter first. Fortunately, the sugar was added last and I was ...
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How do I butter popcorn without making it soggy?
I've tried buttering my popcorn in the past, and it always turns out inconsistent. A few pieces will be soaked with butter, and others have no butter on them at all.
Perhaps there is a way to get the ...
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Does freezing butter or margarine change the properties?
I have a lot of butter & margarine and looking for ways to keep it for longer time.
Will freezing them change melting point, flavor, or anything that could be undesirable when cooking?
Update:
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Is butter ever the same after having been melted?
I was recently doing some experiments with butter which involved melting it gently in the microwave and pouring it into dishes. It seemed to me that after the butter had cooled and re-solidified, it ...
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How much to reduce salt when using salted butter in place of unsalted butter
I normally don't keep unsalted butter on hand since I use it so seldom. So when a recipe calls for salt and unsalted butter among its ingredients would it be alright to use salted butter and reduce ...
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Can I deep fry food in butter instead of vegetable oil?
I was wondering if it is possible to deep fry food that would normally be fried in vegetable oil in butter or lard instead? Will the result be different?
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Should I use salted or unsalted butter if the recipe doesn't specify?
When recipes call for “butter” but doesn’t specify “salted” or “unsalted”, which should I use? Does it matter?
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Is there a trick for softening butter quickly?
I often don't realize a baking recipe requires softened butter until after I start adding in the other wet ingredients and it's too late to wait for butter to soften the normal way (with time). So, I ...
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How to prepare butter for baking when time is limited?
From my experience, the best way to use butter when baking is to let it soften to room temperature. However, sometimes one is short on time and must use the microwave to soften the butter. I always ...
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Cooking an egg without oil or butter
I like scrambled and fried eggs but the butter or oil probably add unnecessary calories. How can I fry an egg with no butter? I tried in a Teflon pan but it was a mess.
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What's the purpose of clarifying butter?
Seriously, if it's just an ingredient in something larger, is it going to make a difference if the butter's been clarified or not?
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Conversion rule: how to switch oil and butter?
Just a moment ago, I was making muffins. The recipe calls for 125ml oil.
As a footnote, it says that you can replace the oil with 125g butter.
Can you do so in every recipe (not just muffins or ...
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What is the butter for in a jam recipe?
I made plum jam at the weekend. The recipe I had (from my Good Housekeeping cookbook) wanted me to simmer the plums in water, add sugar and a knob of butter, then boil until a set was reached.
I ...
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How do you correctly soften butter for spreading?
How do you correctly soften butter for spreading on bread? Is it simply a matter of leaving it at room temperature for a few hours, or do tools like butter conditioners do a better job?
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Substituting butter for oil: Does it matter for baked goods?
When a recipe (like for muffins) calls for vegetable oil, does it matter if I substitute the oil for butter because I want that buttery taste in the muffins?
Do I need to compensate for the ...
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How does butter remain edible for so long without refrigeration?
My wife and I keep a stick of butter in the cupboard rather than the refrigerator. Even with just the two of us, it rarely lasts very long, but I'd say it may go as long as a week without ...
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When baking a cake that calls for butter, should you use salted or unsalted?
I'm baking a cake using a cake mix and extra ingredients. It calls for 5 tbsp of butter, but I'm not sure which to use, salted or unsalted. What difference would it make??
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Making butter at home
I decided to make home made butter. I haven’t done this since I was a kid. We shook the jar until the liquid separated. I wasn’t sure if this meant it was done or not even though I kept reading the ...
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Why is there a difference between softened and melted butter when baking?
I once tried to make some cookies and assumed that melted butter would be the same as softened butter. It didn't work out...
Why does it make a difference if you use softened or melted butter? ...
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Can I always use butter instead of margarine when baking?
Some recipes says use butter or margarine, some say use butter and some say use margarine. My question is, can I always use butter or does margarine have some property that butter doesn't when baking?
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Why do you need raw milk to make butter?
I was reading about making butter at home and all the recipes called for raw (I presume this means unpasteurised) milk. Why is this?
They also said to wait for the cream to separate from the milk. I'...
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What is the purpose of oil or butter in bread?
Specifically in wheat and potato breads, what is the purpose of adding oil or butter to the dough?
I have always assumed it was just for flavor, but I suspect there is some background chemical ...
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How much is a knob of butter?
I was reading a question here on Food and Cooking and no one seemed to know how much it is. I tried to Google convert it to cups but no dice.
So how much is it?
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Is it safe to eat butter after it has crossed its expiration date? Does butter ever spoil in fridge?
I just came back from a long trip and I was cleaning out my fridge, and I noticed that there is an expiration date on the butter. It expired about two months from when I bought it. The butter doesn't ...
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Use Avocado instead of Butter to bake a cake?
This may sound extravagant, but I have tried a very nice chocolate pudding made of avocado, chocolate, and some other ingredients. You could not tell there was avocado in the pudding and the texture ...
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Do I need clarified butter to make mac-n-cheese?
Ok, someone mentioned Mac-n-Cheese. Which led me to a mornay sauce. Which requires a bechamel. Leading to roux. Dropping me on the doorstep of clarified butter. I haven't ever used or made it. Is ...
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What different uses do we assign to salted butter vs. unsalted butter?
What different uses do we assign to salted butter versus unsalted butter?
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Can ghee be used instead of butter in dessert recipes?
Butter is an inevitable ingredient in most of dessert recipes. By definition, ghee is just clarified butter, but to me, the taste is completely different. The taste of butter is more close to heavy ...
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How can I break an emulsion making carotene butter?
I am making carotene butter by mixing clarified butter and carrot juice.
The idea is that I now need to separate the carotene infused butter from the juice. The only problem being that they are very ...
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Butter substitute for 1 cup of butter for baking
What can I substitute for 1 cup of butter in baking recipes (e.g. cookies, muffins, cakes, etc.)?
I'm looking for something that has less saturated fat (and also doesn't have trans fat).
Update: ...
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I accidentally added butter into flour/cocoa powder/baking soda without beating first
I am making cookies and accidentally added my butter directly into my dry ingredients. Now I have chunks of butter and dough that is basically powder.
Is there any way to salvage this even if the ...
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In baking, can yoghurt replace butter?
By baking, I mean cakes / muffins / biscuits.
This is mainly to cut down on fat.
I've tried replacing butter with yoghurt in all of these and the results were OK.
Are there any cases where it's not ...
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Why is the outside of grilled cheese buttered?
Most grilled cheese recipes call for the outward faces of bread to be buttered, while the inside faces have the cheese inserted.
However, this tends to cause your hands to become very oily when eating ...
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Solutions for when heating chocolate and butter doesn't mix well
Yesterday I tried to make brownies that started out with me having to melt unsweetened chocolate with butter in a frying pan on the stove. This did not work well. The chocolate kindof mixed with the ...
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Does sputtering butter mean that water is present?
When I place a pat of butter in a hot pan, the butter melts and begins to sputter and steam. Then steam bubbles pop which sends tiny grease drops flying out of the pan. This happens consistently ...
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Difference in cookie texture if we use melted vs softened butter
I would like to know the difference in the final result if we use softened butter or melted butter in an ordinary cookie recipe.
A few days ago i baked chocolate chips cookies i waited for the ...
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Why is butter incorporated into the dough last when making Brioche?
I made Brioche for the first time tonight using the Rich Man's Brioche recipe from Reinhart's Bread Baker's Apprentice.
The recipe basically leaves out the butter until the very end when the dough is ...
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Why do scrambled/fried eggs stick less when cooked with butter instead of oil?
Whenever I'm doing scrambled or fried eggs, I use butter and a regular frying pan (aluminium I think) without any special non-stick coating. They never stick to the pan, it's as if they're floating on ...
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Can salted butter be used to make lemon curd?
The recipe I want to use to make lemon curd specifically calls for unsalted butter, while many other recipes I've looked at either also specify this, or simply say 'butter', making me unsure whether ...
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How to evenly spread butter in each square of a waffle?
We made large Belgian-style waffles tonight and I found it incredibly difficult to evenly spread the butter in each square. In fact, it was so time consuming, by the time I was done, the waffle was ...
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Is “ghee” clarified butter or beurre noisette?
Reading the Wikipedia pages on “Ghee,” “Clarified butter” and “Beurre noisette” has left me somewhat confused as to what ghee is. Some statements on the pages seem to suggest that it's always ...
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Can clarified butter be used for beurre noir?
The first recipe of "The Nero Wolfe Cook Book" by Rex Stout is for Eggs au beurre noir. For the black butter sauce he gives the following instructions:
"In a skillet melt [...] four
tablespoons ...
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Why add baking powder when creaming sugar and butter?
A friend recently provided me with a family recipe for cookies which instructed me to cream together sugar and butter - so far so good. However, the thing that took me back was that the recipe called ...
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Is adding butter to caramel sauce essential?
I doubt that omitting butter in caramel sauce will have a significant effect on the texture or the taste of the caramel sauce. May I know about the reasons of adding butter inside? The aim of the ...
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How to make coffee-infused butter?
What are some ways to make "coffee-infused butter"?
By that I mean cow butter but injected with espresso, somehow. Essentially, produce a block of butter with strong coffee flavours in it (...
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Properly melting butter and sugar together for butterscotch bar recipe
I've been trying to make butterscotch bars. I'm not a new baker, but I don't have much experience in melting brown sugar and butter together.
The recipe (included at bottom of post) I'm using says ...
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How do I cook shrimp in butter?
I want to cook shrimp in butter. My problem in the past has been that the butter burns if it gets too hot but the shrimp remains fishy if the butter does not get hot enough. Any advice?
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Why is butter usually labeled "Sweet Cream"?
Most (or even all?) butter found at the grocery store is labeled "sweet cream". Is there a distinction between this and another type of cream, and if so, what is it?
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Could I add butter to single cream to make whipped/double cream?
I want to make some whipped cream for millefeuille but I only have single.
If I added butter to single cream and whipped it, would that add enough butterfat to it to make it suitable for whipping?
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