Things You Should Be Buttering (But Probably Aren’t)

My household is always stocked with least two different kinds of butter: I have cooking butter for sautéing and baking, which is mostly a cheap store brand, and a separate eating butter for slathering.

While both butters are always salted, the eating butter is kept at room temperature for easier slathering and, oh, how I slather. I slather it on bread (obviously), but I’ve recently expanded my repertoire to include three somewhat unusual, but delicious foods, and I think you should start slathering similarly.

Potato chips

Putting butter on potatoes is a normal thing, as is dipping potato chips into dairy. Why, then, do we not dip potato chips in butter?

If I had to guess, I would say it has something to do with puritanical values, and I would encourage you to shun those. The truth is that buttered potato chips taste good. Creamy fat has always paired well with salty, crispy things, and this particular combination is downright decadent, but not so rich that you can’t eat a whole bunch. (If you thought you couldn’t eat “just one” before, wait until you add butter.)

You don’t need a lot of butter — a little swoop will do ya — and don’t get too finicky about the kind of potato chip. Butter is delicious on everything from plain to heavily flavoured kettle-cooked chips.

Hard-boiled eggs

Yes, we have written about the buttered hard-boiled egg before, but I’m going to mention it again, just in case some of you out there have not availed yourself of its magic. Like the previous two recommendations, a buttered hard-boiled egg tastes more complex and complete than it has any right. A.A. Newton attributes it to butter’s ability to transform even the most humble and mundane foods:

After some thought (haters will say too much), I’ve decided that the magic lies in butter’s ability to upgrade a breakfast of convenience. Boiled eggs start to feel pretty ho-hum after a while, especially if you eat them most mornings — but even the smallest knob of butter is completely transformative. Suddenly, my go-to protein-rich breakfast has become a treat; something I actively look forward to.

Basically, butter makes everything better, but the above three foods are stellar examples of just how powerful it is. (It’s also really good on saltines and matzoh, but you probably already knew that.)