I love compound butter. I made some with berries last summer and slapped it on French toast. Lifechanging.
But that’s another story for a non-savory time.
Compound butter, hotel butter, butter mixed with a buncha delicious ingredients, butter with a twist. It’s all basically the same thing, and it’s all delicious. This particular compound butter, called “Hotel Butter”, has a lemony parsley flavor and is divine on steak. But it’s also beautiful on fish, fabulous on chicken, perfect stirred into hot, cooked pasta, and irresistible spread on hot, crusty bread.
I made this roll of hotel butter some time ago and it kept (tightly wrapped in plastic wrap and foil) in the freezer, then in the fridge. And it was lovely as ever! I served a big ol’ pat of it on a big t-bone steak last night and…well, the heavens opened up.
On a beef note: I’m usually a ribeye or filet girl…but that t-bone steak was an experience. Utterly delicious. I’ll have to give t-bones a little more attention.
To make the butter, mince up some parsley really finely. You can also use basil, sage, rosemary…any herb that makes your skirt fly up.
Now, zest up a lemon.
Throw some softened butter into the bowl of an electric mixer (I used four sticks because I needed to make a lot, but the recipe below just calls for 2 sticks. You could even go one further and do one stick. You could even go one step further and do half a stick. You could even go one step further and use 2 tablespoons. You could …)
(Okay, I’ll stop now. I just like to provide you lots of options.)
Throw in a whole lotta the minced parsley, along with the lemon zest. It will look like a lot, but you want the butter to be really speckled and flavorful.
Whip it together until it’s nice a mixed…
Then squeeze in the juice of half the lemon, give or take.
Try not to be too impressed with my amazing manicure.
Not.
Whip it all together again, scraping the sides once or twice to make sure everything’s evenly mixed.
Then scrape it all together.
Now, to make the roll, set a long piece of plastic wrap on top of a long piece of foil. Scoop out the butter into a line…
Then bring one side up and over the top of the roll…
Pressing gently with your hands to form a cylinder.
Keep rolling it up, then twist the ends like a piece of candy—make it pretty taut so that the butter will be forced into a nice, cohesive tube shape. Then just pop the roll into the fridge (if you won’t need it for a little while) or the freezer (if you’re in a hurry for it to set/harden.)
Note: If you need a little more direction on rolling it up, check out my French toast recipe for more detailed instructions about rolling up the butter. I didn’t take enough photos this time.
Berry Butter – rolling instructions
Hello, beautiful lover. I’ve missed you!
And…aaah. Look at how lovely that is. Perfectly speckled. Lovely little yellow flecks of zest.
I am now officially hungry.
To grill the steak, melt a tablespoon (give or take) of butter in a heavy skillet over medium-low medium high! heat. If you have vent on your stove, turn it on!
Generously salt and pepper both sides of the steak…
Then throw it into the skillet…
And cook it on both sides until it’s nice and deep golden brown and perfectly medium rare. Should take 1 1/2 to 2 minutes per side, depending on how thick the steak is.
Now, when the steak had about 30 seconds left, I sliced off a nice pat of the butter…
And set it right on top of the steak. Since it was really cold and solid, I wanted to give the butter time to start melting.
Oh my goodness.
Oh, and sorry about the lighting. I was chasing daylight.
Oh my soul. You see that? As the butter melts, the parsley and lemon start to ooze down the surface of the steak and…oh, dear lawsie mercy. This gets me really excited.
It is at this time I will elect not to confess that I took a little bit of the butter and slapped it on my mashed potatoes. Nobody saw me do it. Nobody can prove a thing.
This is yummy, guys! If you try compound butter, you’ll start to love having it in your fridge. Anytime you have grilled chicken, grilled fish, steaks, pastas, or veggies, you can just slice off a little pat and throw it on top. And the flavor possibilities for compound butter? Endless. Add ground peppercorns, garlic, different herbs, crushed red pepper, jalapenos, even minced chipotle pepper.
Enjoy, my friends!
