I Love Butter

I'll admit it.  I love butter.  Butter on toast, on pancakes, on bread, on waffles.  Butter to saute mushrooms, cook eggs, to add to the top of a steaming bowl of clam chowder.  

My favorite part of making chocolate-chip cookies is when you whip the butter together with the brown and white sugar (so yummy.)

I love the scene near the end of the movie "Julie and Julia" when Julie leaves a pound of butter at the museum exhibit of Julia Childs' kitchen.

Ina, Martha, Giada... you had me at butter.

Butter is one (of many...) reasons I will never be a size 6, let alone a size 14.

The only thing I do not like about butter (yes, there is one thing) is that I never seem to have a softened portion out when I need it.  And I always let it soften about 2 seconds too long in the microwave.  And I will not buy whipped butter in a tub (unless I am going camping, because butter is second only to OFF and right before an extra roll of toilet paper as a camping necessity.)  Butter in a dish gets gross and messy and full of crumbs. And butter that is just a tad too hard wrecks a perfectly good piece of toast. 

But just this past weekend my quest for the perfect container for the perfect room-temperature butter came to an end at Hartwick's (our local kitchen supply store, sort of like the Victoria's Secret for people who actually cook and eat) when I spied this lovely red crock known as the Butter Bell Crock:

(insert a choir of angelic singing voices right about here)

How does it work, you might ask, if you were actually having a conversation with me and not reading this or pretending to not read this while you are pretending that you reading something work related when you should be working (you know who you are you naughty people you).

So how does this miracle of modern science work, well, you take a rock-hard stick of butter out of your cold refrigerator, let it soften on the counter, then smooth it into the bell of the Butter Bell.  Pour 1/3 cup cold water into the bottom of the crock, invert bell, and enjoy fresh tasting, softened butter for 30 days (changing the water every 3 days.)   I know, you are asking yourself, because I asked myself, who in the hell has butter around for 30 whole days?  I mean really people, if your butter lasts 30 days you really need to high-tail it to the nearest bakery and buy yourself a loaf of bread and eat something already.  

And you, my butter loving friends, need to scrape that old, crumby butter off that plate and get yourself a Butter Bell. They are the next best thing to giving your butter a hug.

Comments

[Liz Ness]

Okay, one of my friends introduced me to the bell over the holidays. But, it wasn't nearly as humorous! I love butter and I LOVE your photos. I'm sitting here with a full belly (Thai leftovers, they were yummy) and I still drool (in a virtual-non-icky-kind-of-way) over your soup from the previous post. It's evil (but in a man!-that-looks-good way)!

=) Liz

[Yvonne Bradford]

Awesome post Kim!! You crack me up....can't wait to scrap again. Seems like its been ages! Miss ya...y