Picture this: It’s dinner time, and you’ve got a sizzling plate of steak and asparagus in front of you. The steak has butter on it, but it looks different from the kind you use for your toast in the mornings. You take a bite, and are overjoyed with the depth of flavor. You ask your host, “What did you do to the butter?” Their reply, “It’s a secret”.
A secret?! The audacity! Well, lucky for you, we don’t believe in secrets. We know what they did to the butter. They created compound butter. If you’re wondering, “What is compound butter?” you’re in the right place. Keep reading to learn about compound butters, and how to make them easily from home to enhance your home cookin’.
What Is Compound Butter?
Compound butter is essentially flavored butter. Typically, it’s a soft butter that’s been whipped with a variety of savory or sweet ingredients. But you can also use a LĒVO II device to infuse your butter with the ingredients for a more smooth, blended butter.
Compound butters enhance the flavor of practically any dish. Savory compound butters taste great on meats, fish, veggies, bread, and whatever else you want to try. Sweet compound butters taste delicious on scones, pancakes, waffles, rolls, cornbread, or truly, whatever you want!
But what kinds of herbs and spices work best for compound butters, and what exactly should you pair them with? While there are some fail-proof compound butter recipes that’ll always be delicious, the true fun comes from just winging it! We’ll give you a run down of some herb and spice combinations that will taste good no matter what, but if you have an idea we don’t mention, definitely give it a try! Who knows, you might hit the creative jackpot.
Fail-Proof Compound Butter Pairings
While some might have an apt for cavalierly throwing a bunch of spices together and ending up with masterful flavor, most of us rely on recipes. And there’s nothing wrong with that! Below, we’ve included some easy compound butter pairings as a starting point for your compound butter experiments. Once you’ve mastered these, you can move on to more risky flavor combinations.
Easy Savory Compound Butters
Best for use on meats, grilled veggies, potatoes, bread, and other savory plates, these savory compound butters are simple, but fail-proof delicious.
- Shallot Parsley Butter (try with steaks or bread)
- Shallot Chive Butter (try with potatoes or chicken)
- Garlic Chive Butter (try with fish or shrimp)
- Lemon Chive Butter (try with veggies or chicken)
Easy Sweet Compound Butters
Perfect for biscuits, pancakes, waffles, and other sweet delights, these sweet compound butters are sure to please.
- Orange Honey Butter (try with biscuits or cornbread)
- Cinnamon Brown Sugar Butter (try with pancakes or waffles)
- Blueberry Honey Butter (try with waffles)
- Mexican Chocolate Butter (try with scones)
If you’re dying to try out these flavors, keep reading to learn how to easily make your own compound butter at home with LĒVO.
How To Make Compound Butter At Home
Now that we've answered the question, "What is compound butter?" we can move on to the fun part: making it at home! The typical process for making compound butters involves unsalted butter, a hand mixer, parchment paper, herbs & spices, and refrigeration. This traditional method creates butter with visible spices and herbs fully intact in the butter. That can be super yummy, but sometimes it’s nice to enjoy a fully blended, flavored butter. That’s where LĒVO comes in. We’ll go over both methods for compound butter making, so you can get to work!
The "Regular" Method
To make compound butter at home the “regular” way, you’ll put a stick of unsalted butter in a bowl and add in your chosen ingredients, be it herbs, spices, or even fruits! With a hand mixer (or a fork or whisk if you’re feeling strong) mix the ingredients together until the butter forms a somewhat smooth consistency. Next, move your compound butter mixture to parchment paper and form it into a log shape. Wrap it so it’s airtight, and then pop it in the fridge for at least 2 hours. After the allotted time, take out your compound butter and slice off the amount you want to use for your spread. Yum!
The LĒVO Method
The traditional method can be a bit messy, so we definitely prefer making compound butter the LĒVO way. A LĒVO-made compound butter will completely smooth and consistent, compared to the other method.
What's LĒVO? LĒVO is the innovative kitchen device that makes herbal infusion as easy as pushing a button. You can infuse any herb, spice, fruit, or nut into practically any liquid. To make compound butters, simply infuse the herbs into butter directly to create a butter that has balanced flavor in every bite.
Here’s how it works. Simply pop your butter and herbs in the LEVO reservoir, press a button, and ta da! Your butter will be infused with the herbs of you choosing. You can then enjoy this infused butter with a number of culinary delights. Learn more about LĒVO and why people are obsessed with herbal infusion. Check out some of our favorite compound butter recipes below.
- Earl Grey Tea Scones — Simply use your LĒVO to infuse Earl Grey Tea into butter, then enjoy the butter on fresh scones!
- Cinnamon Honey Butter — Easily infuse cinnamon and honey into butter, for use on buns, pancakes, scones, and toast.
- Lavender Honey Butter — Lavender doesn’t just smell like heaven, it tastes like it! Enjoy this compound butter on fresh biscuits, waffles, or warm bread.
- Rosemary Thyme Biscuits — Make rosemary & thyme butter, then enjoy it on fresh biscuits. It can also taste great with meats or grilled veggies.
- Jalapeño Havarti Cornbread — Jalapeño-infused butter goes great with cornbread, or any recipes that call for butter and could use some spice!
- Chocolate Chip Cookie Edibles — LĒVO can also help you infuse *special* flower *wink* into butter in order to make easy edibles!
For easy storage, use LĒVO Herb Blocks. For the most up-to-date information on how to properly store your butter and maximize its freshness, check out our tips to extend the shelf life of your infused butters.
Without further ado, here’s an easy recipe to make your own compound butter with LĒVO! The instructions are flexible to allow you to get creative!
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