Skip to main content
Dessert

To Preserve Butter

A method of preserving butter by adding salt, sugar, and saltpetre.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

To Preserve Butter

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Ensure the butter is thoroughly cleansed of buttermilk.

  2. Mix the salt, sugar, and saltpetre together well.

Salt and pack

  1. Add 1 ounce of the salt mixture to the butter and work it in thoroughly.

  2. Pack the butter into pots, ensuring it is firm and cold.

Store

  1. Store the pots in a cool place, away from air.

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
The fat being preserved; its flavour and texture carry through the salting.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out moisture and slows microbial spoilage, which is the main way the butter is preserved.
Loaf sugar
Adds mild sweetness that softens the sharpness of the salt.
Saltpetre
Helps preserve the butter and guards against spoilage during storage.

The step that matters

Cleansing the butter of buttermilk. Any buttermilk left in the butter holds water and milk solids that can spoil it. Removing it thoroughly lets the salt do its preserving work and helps the butter keep longer.

“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.

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes