How to make browned butter

Let’s make some browned butter

I never used to understand the hype of making browned butter. It just seemed like an extra step in my baking and I was not having it. So I would go on about my baking life making cookies and biscuits and not be phased. After a while I saw quite a few foodies adding browned butter to their cookie recipes. I was determined to understand what the hype was about. And let me tell you, the hype is legitimate! So I started adding this to my recipes and sure enough it didn’t even take that long to make.

I learned how to make brown butter from trial error and yes, you can burn brown butter. It may make no sense but I will explain everything . I hope you enjoy this post and let me know if you have any questions. Just message me in the comments and I will reply asap.

Buon Apetito!

Zorah

how to make browned butter — This is room temperature butter and I find this melts a lot quicker than if the butter was refrigerated. It really does not matter that much, but it makes life easier.

Can I burn browned butter?

You 100% can burn browned butter in a recipe. It may seem counter intuitive, because the whole point is that the butter becomes golden brown? However, once you see the brown/golden specs coming through the buttery foam on top, that’s when you remove it from the heat. When the butter is removed from the heat, it continues to cook. As the pot and butter is still hot, the butter will cook off heat and thus, burning your butter.

Can burnt butter affect my recipe?

Not really, the only thing you may notice is that the recipe you’re making may taste very nutty. When browning butter the correct way, it should be golden, not dark brown. So the darker the butter the more intense the flavour. This could make your cookies (for example) taste a bit overly caramelised/nutty but it will still be quite sweet.

browned butter recipe — This is the colour of the butter just after the butter melted. At this point you need to have a lot of patience and keep checking your butter.

the outcome of a lovely browned butter — This is the outcome of my browned butter. It is a lovely golden brown colour and as you can see it is not burnt/black in colour.

What are the phases the butter goes through and how do I make it?

Melt the softened/cold butter in a medium sized pot. Keep the heat medium at this point and stir often to speed up the process.
After this step, reduce the heat to low-medium. Use a rubber spatula and stir the butter every 30 seconds to make sure it hasn’t begun to brown.
After the butter has melted, the next step is the butter will become very foamy. The foam will distort your view of the base of the pot, where the golden specs form so play close attention.
Keep stirring so you can see past the foam. As soon as some of the golden brown colour comes through the foam, remove from the heat immediately. The butter will continue to cook even after removing it from the heat.
Transfer the butter to a clean heat proof bowl and allow it to cool before adding ingredients.

How much does the butter reduce?

I used 100g of butter for this recipe. After I browned the butter, it came out to 79g. This needs to be kept in mind when reading a recipe. Some recipes will tell you to first measure out the butter and then brown it and they have taken this into consideration. Other recipes will ask you to brown the butter and then measure the amount needed.