Too Easy: Lemon Herb Compound Butter
It’s another crazy easy recipe kinda day!
Compound butters are stupid simple to make, but can add so much dimension to any dish! Just swap out any plain butter in you savory recipes with a compound butter, and you will add so much favor.
I’ve actually shared a compound butter on the blog before (the blood orange butter in this post), but I thought making a post entirely dedicated to it would be a good reminder for those of us that forget they exist, haha.
I loooove compound butters, but I always forget to make them!
This particular compound butter is fresh, vibrant, and perfect for Spring! It’s just lemon zest and some fresh herbs stirred into soft butter, but it’s a total recipe game changer.
I used fresh mint, basil, and parsley here, but you can totally switch up the herbs to suit your tastes! I think that chives would have been an awesome addition. You could also swap the lemon zest out for any other citrus zest for a completely different flavor. Cilantro-lime? That would be perfection on a flank steak. Orange-rosemary? Would probably be heaven stirred into some sort of brown rice pilaf. Grapefruit-thyme? Kiiiinda wanna slap some of that on a white fish fillet.
This is actually the compound butter that I mentioned yesterday in my gnocchi post! I browned up some of the boiled gnocchi in this, and it was pretty dang delicious!
I think it would be even better tossed into some pasta with some shaved parmesan and a bit of pasta water. It’s like the grown-up version of butter and parmesan spaghetti š
Other incredible ways to use this super easy compound butter?
- It’s FANTASTIC to cook scrambled eggs in
- Great for just spreading on toast or rolls
- Excellent topper for any meat
- Perfect to stir into mashed potatoes
- Basically almost any place you would use regular butter
Also, it totally just occurred to me that today is April Fool’s Day, and I should have done some sort of joke post…Ohhhhh well. How easy this one is, is basically a joke, right?
Lemon Herb Compound Butter
Yield: 1/2 cup of compound butter
Ingredients:
- 1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- zest of 1 lemon
- 1/4 cup packed fresh herbs*
- pinch of kosher salt
Directions:
- Stir together all of the ingredients in a bowl until fully combined and incorporated.
- Scoop the butter onto wax or parchment paper, and roll it up, twisting the side.
- Refrigerate until solid and use in place of butter in all of your favorite savory recipes.
*I used a combination of fresh mint, parsley, and basil, but feel free to use any fresh herbs you have on hand (chives and/or marjoram would be lovely).
Such a great reminder for me to make some compound butter! Love your combo ideas! š
Good it worked! Haha, thank you, Senika!