Stretch your butter budget and make it a little healthier. Save money on buying butter spreads. Make your own and know what those ingredients are that are in it!
Cut back on saturated fat and use much less butter on your toast and muffins by softening 2 sticks of butter to room temperature. Then put the whisk attachment on your stand mixer (I use a Kitchen Aid).
Start whipping those two sticks of butter while you slowly drizzle one cup of vegetable, olive, or canola oil into it. (Your choice of oil). I like the canola because olive oil adds it's own taste to the butter. Canola oil leaves the butter tasting like butter.
Scrape up the sides now and then to incorporate all the butter into the oil. Whip until light and fluffy. It might look like a light cake batter when it's done. Pour it into individual containers with lids and refrigerate until needed.
Use for frying eggs or sauteing vegetables because the oil raises the burning point of the butter and it won't burn as easily. It's delicious on toast, English muffins or crackers. It stays soft right out of the refrigerator. Try grilled cheese sandwiches. The butter just glides across the bread.
I hope you try this. My nutritionist was thrilled when I told her about this.
By Deb from Williamstown, New Jersey
Here are the questions asked by community members. Read on to see the answers provided by the ThriftyFun community.
I was reading a tip on how to make butter go a long way. It stated to warm the butter slightly, then add equal amount of canola oil then blend together.
What is canola oil? I live in the U.K and haven't heard of this, but would like to try this tip. If anyone has any other ideas for making butter stretch longer for my budget, I would appreciate your input. Many thanks.
By helen from U.K
My sister uses this recipe. Take 1 pound of butter and let soften. In a large mixing bowl put butter, 1/4 cup of canola oil and 1/4 cup of water. Blend well. Put butter in small containers and keep in refrigerator. You cannot freeze this recipe, but the butter will stay soft and it will last a long time in the refrigerator. If 1/4 cup water and canola oil is not enough just add a little more. This will still have that good butter taste Vegetable oil would probably work just as well.
Canola oil is rapeseed oil, just plain vegetable oil in the UK. :-)
I like to use extra virgin olive oil instead of canola or other vegetable oils. Extra virgin olive oil is much healthier and helps with heart disease, atherosclerosis, diabetes, colon cancer, and asthma.
My sister used to mix 1/2 butter with 1/2 margarine, and beat in with a mixer some buttermilk, and it is delicious. You can only use it as a spread, and you can't cook with it. Too much liquid and recipes would not turn out well. I am thinking 1/2 cup buttermilk but not entirely sure.
Thanks, tillie2, for the "spread" version of the stretch-butter-recipe. That's one I'll definitely use, as it reduces the bad fatty acids guilt trip I get when stacking butter on top of that good Cincinnati's Jungle Jim's Rosemary Bread.
Yet to answer Helen from UK, where I lived for 2 years. In the 50's, the idea to mix butter with oil for frying
comes from the idea that the butter browns too fast, but when added to equal amounts of canola or other good fatty acid oils it retains the butter taste and won't burn as fast. If you love homemade, fried Spaetzle [noodles] that's how I heat them to this day, living in the middle of USA. It's a German family favorite !
many thanks for your tips to my question about stretching butter with oil. i am going to experement with these many thanks helen x
You can also warm the butter and add the same amount of honey, mixing until fully cooled. This is a nice spread for breads, cereals, etc. and can be used sparingly.
Hi again well I have tried 1 of the tips for blending butter with oil I used extra virgin oil but found the taste too strong so I am going to do it again with olive oil which is not as strong I know it is down to individual taste so I will let you know what works for me once again many thanks to all the replies. helen x
Hi again just to say I mixed the butter with olive oil instead of the extra virgin oil and it worked well without the strong taste, so many thanks again for your replies. helen x
Hi there,
Canola oil is just a very cheap highly processed vegetable oil. I recommend Olive oil to stretch your butter I have been doing this myself for quite a while to get away from margarine.
Canola oil is rapeseed oil.
I have used avocado oil too. Not any flavour I can taste. Thank you for sharing your experience
The price of butter is getting outrageous, I know there is a recipe out there for doubling a pound of butter with oil but I don't know what it is. Anyone?
To make a spreadable butter I use 1 stick of softened butter to 1/2 cup olive oil and add 1/2 teaspoon of salt and whip the devil out of it. You can multiply this recipe and freeze it, but I make it as I need it. I only use this as a spread, not for cooking.
This may be of some help:
Stretching butter:
thriftyfun.com/
Many cooks can substitute cooking oil in recipes that call for butter with little change to the original recipe. This is a page about substituting oil for butter in recipes.
ThriftyFun is one of the longest running frugal living communities on the Internet. These are archives of older discussions.
You can stretch your butter by making it into a butter spread. Use 1 cup warm water, 1 cup light olive oil, 1 tsp. granulated lecithin, 1/2 to 1 tsp. salt according to taste.
