Salted Butter vs. Unsalted Butter

Great cooks will tell you that butter is the main secret ingredient that will make your food absolutely delicious. Reading through a variety of recipes, you will often come across butter as an ingredient. In savory dishes, it is used as a seasoning and also as a fat while in baking, it is used as leaven and also a liquid. However, most people do not know when to use salted or unsalted butter. This article breaks it down for you.

Salted Butter

When salt is added during the process of making butter you get salted butter. Salt gives the butter taste and is also used to preserve the butter so that it has a long shelf life. That is why when refrigerated, you can keep salted butter for as long as 5 months. Unsalted butter, on the other hand, can only be kept for 3 months under the same conditions. The question that arises is in regard to the amount of salt found in salted butter. Well, 4 major brands were compared and it was found that on average, in every 10g serving of butter, there is 80mg of sodium. This means that you have 8 mg of sodium in each gram of butter. This is what it translates to in approximate measurements:

• 2 cups of butter or 1 block is 454 grams and contains a little bit over 1.5 teaspoons of salt.
• 1 cup of butter or 0.5 block is 227 grams and contains about 0.75 teaspoons of salt.
• 5 cups of butter or 1 stick is 114 grams and contains about 0.333 teaspoon of salt.

If you have a recipe that asks you to use unsalted butter but you only have salted butter, then reduce any salt that needs to be added by the amounts given here above. If your recipe had not asked you to put in additional salt, then you can expect that your finished product will be saltier than expected.

Unsalted Butter

When the food you are cooking has no tasting options, then you will often find the recipe calling for unsalted butter. If you are baking a cake, you may not be able to tell if you have enough salt in the batter.  As such, you will find that the recipe will call for a specific amount of butter or will call for sweet butter or unsalted butter.

If you find your butter on sale, buy in bulk and freeze it for as long as 6 months. You can put it in the fridge during the night to thaw it out and use in the morning.

Now you know which butter is right for your need. Next is, finding the right butter supplier for you. This article, here, will help you choosing the right butter supplier for you. However, to save your time, Puri Pangan Utama supplies variety kind of butter that you can choose based on your need. Choose which butter you need here and let us take care of the rest.