Today’s local newspaper carries an article on butter. Should you keep it in the fridge or in the cupboard? The advantage of keeping it in the cupboard is that it’s spreadable. The disadvantage is that it will eventually spoil. How long can you safely keep it in your cupboard?
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| Papa at the Christmas Eve buffet, 1956 |
Back in the day – let’s say it’s the 1950s – my parents kept butter (or was it margarine?) in the corner of a cupboard. Yes, in my mind’s eye, I see it there now. I would know right where to get it if I needed to butter my toast. However, my maternal grandfather (aka “Papa”), had had a bad experience with rancid butter, and he refused to use it unless it was served cold.
Why didn’t we just buy spreads, you ask. I don’t remember soft spreads until I was married – in the ‘70s. And even then, there was backlash. “Don’t pay for expensive spreads,” was the money-wise tip. “Whip your own with one teaspoon of water to ½ cup butter / margarine.” I wasn’t about to do that.
For years, I didn’t buy butter. I used brick margarine when I baked, and my favorite brand was Parkay. What happened to Parkay anyway? It hasn’t been available in my local market for years. I now use mostly butter when I bake. As for spreads, I like Brummel and Brown as a more healthful alternative. Mike chooses “the lower price” spread. So, there we are – his and her spreads.
I find butter today to be very stiff. Leaving it on the counter, even for a day or two, does not soften it. I heard that this phenomenon is being studied by the Canadians, so apparently I’m not the only one who thinks something changed.
Neither butter nor margarine is good for us, though. Canola oil is a better alternative if substitution is possible. And applesauce works just as well in some baked goods, though I think the end product tends to be drier and to spoil more quickly.
How
do you manage butter / margarine / spreads? KW
3 comments:
I agree that butter tends to stay hard, but then my house isn't always the warmest--especially the kitchen unless I've been baking. I use one cube of unsalted butter and one cube of Imperial margarine in most of my cookies and that works well. Some I use all butter. As one friend once said, if you're going to make cookies, you might as well make GOOD cookies. I, too, used to use Parkay but don't see it. We use Can't Believe It's Not Butter Light for everyday use on toast, etc.
We have a three-tiered system. We buy butter, put it in the freezer, with one pound left out in the refrigerator. Out of that one pound, we take one cube and put it in the cupboard, and at the consistency is just right for spreading. It doesn't spoil or go rancid. We use butter or oil in all our baking.
Just the other day Nick said, "Maybe someday we'll be the kind of people who leave butter on the counter". I asserted that if we're not those people by now, we probably won't be. Our butter is in the refrigerator. If we make toast, we do it on the griddle, so it's okay that the butter is cold. It seems I softened some for baking one day and it was very spreadable. Could the difference be between salted and unsalted?
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