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Making and Curing Butter

A butter cured with salt, sugar, and optional saltpetre.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 98,233 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Making and Curing Butter

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the butter

  1. Wash and beat the butter to remove buttermilk.

  2. Work in ¼ ounce of coarse sea salt per pound of butter.

  3. Let the butter rest for 24 hours.

Cure and pack

  1. Mix 4 ounces of salt, 2 ounces of loaf sugar, and ½ ounce of saltpetre.

  2. Beat the mixture well and incorporate it into the butter.

  3. Pack the butter into stone jars or well-seasoned containers.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Butter
Provides the fat base; washing and beating out buttermilk removes milk solids that would spoil the cure.
Salt
Draws out moisture and preserves the butter, slowing spoilage during curing.
Loaf sugar
Adds mild sweetness and balances the saltiness of the cured butter.
Saltpetre
Helps preserve the cured butter and maintain its colour; it is optional in this record.

The step that matters

Beating out the buttermilk. Buttermilk and milk solids left in the butter can spoil and reduce how long the cure keeps it. Thorough washing and beating removes them before salting.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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