"Default" Butter: Salted or Sweet?

[alligande]

Thanks Allen,

I have always wondered why american butter was tastless to me, I have tried everything I can get my hands and always end up being disapointed. Now I know its not my imagination there is a real difference.

Karen

[alligande]

Anne,

I am with you on the unsalted/salted butter taste issue. I am going to throw this out as an idea, and it is just an idea. In pastry as in most aspects of cooking we all have a strong french bias, in the way we were trained etc, so as french butter is unsalted is this why we beleive recipes should be formulated with unsalted. Just a thought.

Karen

[bleudauvergne]

In pastry as in most aspects of cooking we all have a strong french bias, in the way we were trained etc, so as french butter is unsalted is this why we beleive recipes should be formulated with unsalted. Just a thought.

Hm, not sure. I live in France and most all industrially produced butter is offered in salted and unsalted versions. I think that it may depend where you grew up in France as well. I have, for instance, a recipe for gateau bretan that calls for "farm butter" and when I inquired more deeply into it with the woman who makes these cakes, she indicated that it was salted butter, as it is salted in Britanny, like a cultured beurre de barratte. My mother-in-law, an established home cook in the midi, also strongly opines on the qualities of salted butter. I personally don't inquire when I buy my butter from the producers at the market, which comes in a ball or is cut off of an irregularly shaped block. Sometimes it does come salted. I think when it comes down to the wire, professional standards may be quite rigid, but in cooking with recipes from books at home, we can't be entirely purists in the matter and turn up our nose at salted butter just because it acts as a preservative and the butter could last longer on the shelf. These days with refrigerated shipping and hygeine standards the way they are in the grand commerce, we can't even imagine that a salted butter off the shelf will reach us any older than the unsalted version.

[Chud62120798]

Thanks to everyone for this discussion. I'm baking a honey chocolate cake from Nigella Lawson's book " Feast ", and she makes no mention of what kind, so now I'm going to use unsalted cultured butter. *get off the key board cat!* eeeeeeeeee

[andiesenji]

Prior to my Christmas vacation, I ordered 8 pounds of the Cabot butter, 4 pounds of the Euro-style and 4 pounds of the Old-fashioned.

I finally used the last of the Euro-style (unsalted) and ordered another 8 pounds plus 8 pounds of the Old-fashioned.

It freezes well and I want to keep it on hand.

I found that it works great in sauces, better than the Plugra, and is terrific in pastry.

I made shortbread with the Old-Fashioned and it was supurb.

it is costly, but not any more so than when I make my own, if I figure my time as part of the cost. Adding my time in addition to everything else, my homemade stuff costs me about 7 bucks a pound.

[tan319]

Speaking of French, the restaurant I apprenticed in, Alsace in nature, used salted butter for everything except most pastries.

To saute with, everything.

[culinary bear]

Speaking of French, the restaurant I apprenticed in, Alsace in nature, used salted butter for everything except most pastries.

To saute with, everything.

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We don't even have salted butter in our work kitchen... I'd have to order salted butter in specially if I wanted to make shortbread.

[artisanbaker]

i would feel confident saying that in any application the nature (moisture, ferments, etc) of the butter is far more important than the salt content.

[Wendy DeBord]

i would feel confident saying that in any application the nature (moisture, ferments, etc) of the butter is far more important than the salt content.

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I agree with Artisanbaker. The freshness and moisture content are far more important to me then the salt content.

I've baked with both salted and non, I've never seen a difference or tasted an objectional salt flavor. I like extra salt in alot of my baked items. I think it's under used in the pastry kitchen.

[rooftop1000]

If I know for sure I am baking I try to remember to get unsalted butter but for eating I much prefer regular industrial salted butter except when I can get my hands on some Icelandic regular industrial salted butter...the shipping kills ya

I drove my grandmother nuts years ago, if sh eaccidentally got unsalted butter I could smell it literally when I opened the fridge never liked it ...there must have been some kind of major difference.....I can still smell the difference I always sniff(My own piece) in restaurants to see if i need to salt my buttered bread.

T

[JustKay]

This may be Pastry Chef Blasphemy, but when I bake with unsalted butter and add or adjust salt in the recipe vs. baking with salted butter and adding/or subtracting salt in the recipe, I really see no difference.

I'm just a homebaker but I second that. I do bake a lot of cakes and cookies (I sell them) and I grab whatever's on sale, salted or unsalted, and then adjust accordingly.

The only time I get fussy about butter is when I do roll-in doughs, like croissant or danish, or I'm making something that relies mostly on the butter for taste, like shortbread for instance.

In those cases I like to use the high butterfat butters like Plugra, or Kerrygold (my current favorite.)

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I use Kerrygold whenever I make shortbreads. It really does make adifference.

kerrygold does come in a gold wrapper, but I dont think it has creme de la creme on the wrapper. Kerrygold is a salted butter that is imported from Ireland.

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Salted Kerrygold = gold foil. Unsalted Kerrygold = silver foil.

Edited January 22, 2005 by kew (log)

[rmazucco]

As a very rough rule of thumb, I'd say that most (UK!) salted butters have a more pronounced buttery taste that most unsalted butters.

isn't that funny - I've always found that unsalted (UK) butter has a more "buttery" taste, even comparing the same brand of salted/unsalted butter. for that reason I much prefer unsalted - at least spread on bread rolls or biscuits.

[culinary bear]

As a very rough rule of thumb, I'd say that most (UK!) salted butters have a more pronounced buttery taste that most unsalted butters.

isn't that funny - I've always found that unsalted (UK) butter has a more "buttery" taste, even comparing the same brand of salted/unsalted butter. for that reason I much prefer unsalted - at least spread on bread rolls or biscuits.

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nooo! heresy. :)

de gustibus non est disputandem!