Butter

Ingredient of the Day: BUTTER
How many of us like butter? Come on. Let's be totally honest. Butter is so good. We can cook with it, bake with it, and finish things off with it, and let's not forget spreading it over some fresh out of the oven buns. DELARSHIOUS!!!! (i know...not a real word, but it is in my book) Moving on...and back to the topic at hand BUTTER.
I am going to be honest and say that I try really hard not to add a ton of fat into my recipes, but there are certain things substituting margarine or low fat for butter, well...it just doesn't cut it.

Since Christmas is just around the corner, and baking is at an all time high, and all kinds of veggies will be gracing many dinner tables, I thought it would be fitting to post about this deliciously, very obviously fattening, yet so tempting lovely pale of yellow yumminess.

That brings me to COMPOUND BUTTER.What is compound butter? To put it plainly, it is plain ole butter, softened (not melted) that is fancied up by putting varying ingredients into it. Mixing it up, and then placing back into the refrigerator to set up again. When I make my compound butters, I like to roll them up into cylinder shapes making it easier to cut and serve on top of a warm steak, veggies, or to finish of a sauce. The varying ingredients are and can be endless.Some examples: Lemon/Lime Zest, any herb of your liking, chili flakes, garlic, pepper, cinnamon, brown sugar, sea salts, and any spice blends you can dream of. Making the butter savoury or sweet.

Now let's take a simple vegetable side dish. One that will more than likely be at more than a handful of tables this holiday season.CORN. Corn is one of those vegetables that tastes great with butter, salt and pepper, but is even better when you COMPOUND BUTTER it UP!!!!I came up with this recipe last summer. It was a hit. Since then, I've served it many different places and have had rave reviews on it, so since I am in the giving spirit....(thanks to Christmas) I thought I would share it with my faithful blog followers.So simple...yet everyone will wonder what you did with the old staple stand by side dish of corn. Here's the facelift.

Lime Compound Butter
1 lb butter (softened at room temperature and placed in a small mixing bowl)Zest of 3 LimesJuice of 1 1/2 limesSea Salt to tasteCracked Pepper to taste1/4 tsp garlic or less if you wish

Place all ingredients in the bowl with softened butter and mix well. Take a good size piece of cling wrap or wax paper and place the mixed butter in the center of the paper. Using one of the outer edges of the paper, form the butter into a log and roll. Store in the refrigerator until ready for use.

Corn:
Corn Cobs, Kernals, Fresh or Frozen. Once your corn has been cooked, take desired amount of lime compound butter and mix into warm corn. Serve and Enjoy!!!!

You can do so much with compound butter. Try it next time a vegetable, meat dish, or dinner roll could use a little pick me up or facelift. Take some of your favourite flavours and create your own compound butter. You'll be surprised with the results and how little effort it takes to transform a simple dish.
Until we cook again :)