The Absolute Best Spray Butter Actually Does Taste Like Butter

Cooking sprays are all the rage, and understandably so — using them is so convenient since they offer good coating and simultaneously use way less product. But have you ever heard of spray butter, a somewhat mysterious sister to the regular cooking spray? It's still oil-based, but it's supposed to taste just like real butter. Most of these butter sprays are primarily designed for the flavor component, intended to be used on popcorn, steamed veggies, and anything else you want to gently flavor like butter. With several brands promising flavorful authenticity, we tested four butter sprays and ranked them worst to best. The ultimate winner was I Can't Believe It's Not Butter, which totally lived up to its name.

According to our taste tester, the I Can't Believe It's Not Butter Original Spray really, really tastes like butter. It's actually made from soybean oil, but one Amazon reviewer said that "it tastes more like butter than butter," and some have admitted to preferring the 12-ounce bottle over the 8 ounces because they use up so much of it — for context, each 8-ounce bottle comes with 1,130 sprays. The secret to this supreme flavor could be in the salt, which was specifically highlighted by our reviewer. Because you're using a much smaller amount of the spray than you would real butter, the saltiness brings a much-needed dimension to the taste. Not to mention, there are plenty of foods that benefit from salted butter.

Our reviewer was very impressed by the packaging of this product, as it actually has a spraying mechanism that differs from other products in the category. Normally, you only press once and get a continuous stream spraying out. In contrast, the Original Spray has the kind of nozzle that releases smaller bursts of faux butter and requires multiple presses for releasing a greater amount. This gives you more control over how much you're using and how evenly you're coating, say, grilled corn on the cob. It's also a pretty handy way for the company to count the servings and provide accurate nutritional information.

People on a low-fat diet, for example, can benefit from knowing that up to four sprays don't contain any significant amount of fat, while six sprays contain 0.5 grams of fat. As one customer reported on Amazon, the Original Spray is "a must have for my husbands low fat diet! He doesn't feel deprived at all! The spray reduces the amount he applies and he doesn't really notice!" You'll find the same spraying mechanism on the company's Garlic Flavored Vegetable Oil Spray, in case you're looking for something that leaves a slightly bolder impact of flavor.