Matzah is a kind of (unleavened) bread…
Perhaps you meant to respond to VeryHappy re unleavened bread? I was explaining why Breakstone and matzah are a perfect Passover pairing.
I’m not Jewish, but I love butter on matzah! Yum!
years ago, I watched a butter-eating contest on TV; people are literally eating sticks of butter. To this day it makes me nauseus just thinking about it.
Someone in one of my neighborhood FB groups jist posted about where to buy French butter locally. My favorite French baker in town says her family makes their own -
This is the general recipe - she says may take a few tries to get the salt right
Bonus points to anyone who will
Be the Guinea pig and try it for us all!
The things you learn! You could leave butter outside the fridge! You can add butter to coffee!
We used to use the Land of the Lakes butter, but after hearing about Kerry Gold a while ago, we switched. Love this butter - especially to make ghee with. I store the ghee in a glass jar inside one of my cabinets. H uses it on everything when I have it available!
Well, I buy ghee but would love to know how you make it!
I bought the Kirkland butter from NZ once. My tastebuds couldn’t really tell the difference between that and the standard (including supermarket) brands. I always had pounds of butter in my freezer but I’m finally down to a few half-sticks with a full stick in a butter dish on the counter. Probably the next time I see a good local sale, I’ll buy a pound for the freezer.
Making ghee is very simple and with the instant pot - even simpler. I follow this recipe:
I don’t have an instapot, but it looks like I could make it in my little rice cooker, no?
I’ve been using Macademia Nut Oil for high heat. It is light and has a very light flavor. I’ve not made ghee, but had a college BF who was in India from 6 months until 5 years who made us some ghee. He loved Indian food and in his childhood was fluent in Hindi, the dialect of the village where his dad was a MD missionary and also English (of course). He’d automatically speak in the language of whomever he was speaking to. Sadly, he lost all of that after they left India.
I used to be a butter snob/fanatic but I’ve mellowed out quite a bit. I love a big chunk of cold butter with a dab of strawberry jam on a single bite of a croissant, and in that particular application where you’re biting directly into a chunk of butter the quality/flavor is definitely noticeable.
In general I’ve found that I prefer any cultured butter over any uncultured butter, regardless of brand. I used to love the Vermont Creamery butter mentioned above, but I swear at some point several years back something changed and it wasn’t as good anymore so I stopped buying it (still good, just lost some of the distinctive flavor).
I also enjoyed butter made from the same milk as Parmigiano cheese - I think Delitia brand? Great stuff.
These days I very rarely really eat butter straight anymore, but I keep some handy for baking. Plugra and Kerrygold are definitely solid standby options, but mostly I just buy Strauss just because I like their story and it feels vaguely envrionmentally more responsible to buy a US brand. But honestly it’s just a very good uncultured butter and as mentioned if I wanted something to eat with a croissant I’d go find anything at all cultured instead.
I also used to quite enjoy President (a French brand) but there also I feel like the quality changed. I recall liking Isigny as well - I think I’ve tried all the brands in the linked article at one point or another, actually.
You can make it in a regular pot on the stove as well. The instant pot just makes the timing of when to take it out easier.
Wow. You guys all have a much more advanced palate than I do. I just use the Kirkland brand (salted – always salted). I tried Kerrygold once and couldn’t really tell the difference.
I’m kind of the same way about wine. Don’t waste your fancy stuff on me.
What got me started was way back when I was 17. I spent the summer knocking around France with a friend, and for a week we stayed solo at a villa owned by one of his relatives in a little mountain village.
The first morning I went downstairs and bought 2 croissants from a bakery next door, along with butter and strawberry jam from a tiny little grocery store. We’d rip the croissants apart and slather on huge chunks of butter and jam.
The 2nd morning I got 4 croissants. Added 2 every day until the last day I was buying a dozen croissants for just the two of us. The owner of bakery served me every morning and was beyond amused and slightly horrified by the end.
Those amazing flavors of the butter, jam, and croissants from that tiny little village are what I’ve chased on and off for the past 30+ years
To that end, I think I’ve tried every French butter I could find in the US at one point or another.
Great story. I’d love to live that life of even ONE croissant a day with generous butter and jam! My now body will have it but I swear my midsection says “be careful”! ![]()
I also never cared about butter until I was 17 and spent the summer in France.
Now I’m a butter snob.
At breakfast today at a place with a humungous menu and ended up with the challah french toast. Was happy to see the waiter brought a little carafe of syrup. But I was disappointed when I asked for butter and the grumpy old waiter pointed to the bowl of Smartbalance mini-tubs… “it’s margerine, like butter”.
Sadly, neither H nor I can taste any difference in most butters. We do use butter and not margarine but otherwise, we are pretty oblivious. We have bought kerrygold and honestly couldn’t tell the difference between that and the regular Costco butter we normally buy in 1/4 pound sticks, 4# at a time.
