11 Best Ways To Soften Butter

While it's incredibly tempting to unwrap that stick of butter, pop it on a plate, and toss it in the microwave for a designated amount of time to soften it, resist the urge. Unless you're using the perfect settings, your butter will come out an unevenly melted mess. You will have both melted and solid parts, and mixing them won't offer a useful solution. However, there are several ways you can use the microwave to soften butter, and the most successful one is to make it into a steam room.

Instead of just placing a stick in the microwave to soften butter fast, use a microwave-safe cup or bowl and fill it with water. Microwave it for at least two minutes, or until it boils and steams. You want your microwave to turn into a mini spa-like steam room, and once it's reached that point, you are safe to quickly remove the dish or cup of boiling water using oven mitts or heat-protected gloves. Quickly place your stick of butter in the steamy microwave, close the door, and let it sit for about 10 minutes. If you choose to chop up your butter first, this process will be more effective, or move along faster. A stick will take longer and may not soften as evenly. Use a warm but not hot plate to put the butter on for even better results. This way, it will be receiving indirect heat from all angles.

While many routes to softened butter involve sitting and waiting, this one is a little more hands-on, and dare we say, more fun. Place your butter in a plastic baggie and squeeze all of the air out and seal it shut. Use the warmth of your fingers to mash and pinch the butter. This will not only help to warm it up without fully heating it, but you will reach even the depths of the butter stick using this method. Even for adults, this can be a little stress reliever similar to squeezing a stress ball or popping bubble insulation. Take a quick break from standing on your feet in the kitchen all day and mash your butter around by hand.

If you have children, this is an especially good technique to use, as long as they don't get curious and try to open up the baggie. Hand the bagged butter off to an age-appropriate child and let them work their magic. Not only will the activity distract them and you'll have nicely softened butter, but it will help to give them a sense of pride for being able to help out with the baking. When it's all softened and ready to use, simply slice the bag open or turn it inside out and scrape every last bit of the butter into your bowl. If you don't mind getting your hands dirty, pinch the inside-out bag between two straight fingers and drag them from top to bottom.

For those of you who have been itching all week to get going on your new baking recipe, then you may have very well reviewed your recipe beforehand and known in advance that you will be using softened butter. If this is the case, then you can certainly use our favorite set-and-forget method by leaving butter out on your countertop overnight. If you're planning on diving into your cooking endeavors in the afternoon or evening, you can certainly remove the butter from the refrigerator the morning of.

However, there's a reason that we typically keep butter and other dairy products in the refrigerator. As much as possible, we want to avoid the growth of bacteria, even if you plan on baking it into a delicious, piping-hot recipe later on. In order to avoid this issue, stick to using the only type of butter you should leave out at room temperature – pasteurized, salted butter. The salt helps to ward off unwanted bacteria, according to the Food and Drug Administration. However, not even salted butter should be left out for more than several days at a time, as butter is intended to be stored in refrigeration.

All in all, leaving your salted and pasteurized butter out on the counter overnight is perfectly safe. Only leave out the amount you're going to use at a time to ensure it all gets used up the next day and doesn't continue its inhabitance on the kitchen counter.

If you're working with particularly stiff butter, especially if it's been frozen, then the task of softening it may seem like it could take hours or even days to accomplish. Don't fear, there is a method that works particularly well but can be a little messy. This can be done with frozen or stiff butter, but doesn't work well for butter that is already on its way to softening. The goal is to create as much surface area as possible so that the heat from the room can affect it as efficiently as possible. In order to do that, consider grating your butter with a cheese grater.

This method is similar to cubing it but yields faster results, which is why it's recommended for frozen butter. In addition, it is quite a bit less messy if you're working with a solid block of frozen butter that's less likely to crumble and melt in your hands. In order to avoid slippery fingers that could, in fact, result in a gashed knuckle, keep the waxed paper on the outside of the butter. Peel away the part you plan to grate and hold onto the papered portion. Continue to peel the paper away as you move down the stick, and take your time when you get close to the end. Use the grate size you would for cheddar cheese for tacos. This will result in consistent shreds, that should take around 10 minutes or so to soften.

Reading about the easiest method to cream butter when baking won't help you out here, because any baker will tell you that you should never cream cold butter. In fact, most of the time when we are softening butter, it's because we plan on creaming it in the mixer later on, which results in fluffy, airy, whipped, and creamy fat. However, if your goal is to simply soften butter, and not to produce creamed butter, then it's safe to go ahead and toss it into the mixer. Cut it up into chunks, so your solid block doesn't attach itself to the paddle and become a dangerous hazard that you'll have to duck and hide from. You don't need a block of butter flinging across your kitchen at full speed.

Start the mixer on a slow setting until it begins to break up. As it mashes and mushes into smaller bits, you can crank the speed a little more. Eventually, you'll find that the butter becomes a denser version of creamed butter. This method introduces room-temperature air into all of its nooks and crannies, all at once. Before the butter has fully softened, remove it from the mixer using a rubber spatula, and let it sit for an additional period of time, five or so minutes, to allow it to finish softening. Although this method does produce more dishes, if you're planning on using your mixer later on in the recipe anyway, then no harm is done.

Although it's typically not recommended to soften butter in the microwave, desperate times call for desperate measures. The reason that folks usually avoid using the microwave for softening butter is that, on a high setting, your butter is likely to melt. Once butter is melted, it's difficult to revive and tends to take on a whole new consistency. Instead of tossing your butter in for 30 seconds and praying for a miracle, it's time to use some of those fancy settings on your microwave. While many of us haven't ventured beyond the 'reheating leftovers' and 'potato' settings, there's actually quite a bit you can do with that handy dandy machine.

Place your butter on a microwave-safe plate that doesn't tend to retain much heat. Then, set your microwave to power level three, which translates to thirty percent. If you don't know what microwave power levels actually mean, you're not alone. Just think of it like the temperature of your oven or stovetop. A lower temperature will help to evenly cook food from the inside out, while a high temperature hits the surfaces of the food harder. Your 'reheat' microwave setting does this for you, but you can always plug it in manually yourself. Start by letting your butter heat for 20 seconds, and then from there check it in five-second increments until it's reached your desired softness. Do not walk away from this one, or you may find yourself with a plate of runny, melted butter.