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To Preserve Butter

This recipe preserves butter by adding salt, sugar, and saltpetre and storing it cold.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 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 ↓

To Preserve Butter

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Thoroughly cleanse the butter from buttermilk.

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

Salt and pack

  1. Add 1 ounce of the mixture to the butter and work it in until well combined.

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

Store

  1. Store the butter in a cool place, away from air, for at least one month.

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
Forms the base of the dish and carries the flavour and richness of the preserve.
Common salt
Draws out moisture and inhibits microbes, which helps the butter keep.
Loaf sugar
Adds mild sweetness and softens the sharpness of the salt.
Saltpetre
Acts as a curing agent that helps preserve the butter and stabilise its colour.

The step that matters

Working the mixture through the butter. Salt and curing agents only preserve where they reach. Working the mixture until fully combined spreads it evenly, so no pockets are left unsalted and prone to spoilage.

“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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