Ever spread lard on toast? Do you prefer croissants made with lard? Is everyone's favourite dish these days lard chicken (I mean the Indian dish, not the Soul Food dish, which is of course popular in some locales).
Nope. Butter is favoured because it tastes unctuous. Nothing to do with Big Cow or any special interest lobby local to certain valleys in the USA. Except maybe Big Bacon Drippings, because if there's one thing better for a grill cheese than butter it's bacon grease (thick-sliced sourdough bread, sharp Cheddar cheese, a shmear of chili crisp)
Now, suet has been demonized to the point that nobody makes suet pudding any more. A shame, really.
Butter is favored because most people had it in their youth. Some regions loves Nato and Chicken feet, others cheese and oysters. What's the most delicious? It depends of your own history.
I spread olive oil on my toast and prefer the croissants made with that as well. My favorite dish is fried tempeh.
Butter is NOT favored because most people had it in their youth, but because of its extremely distinct flavour.
"Unctuous" is certainly not specific enough, the reason butter (and ghee) is so delicious is its butteriness, i.e. it has a highly distinct taste. All properly rendered animal fats have highly distinct tastes and serve different purposes. Schmaltz tastes slightly of chicken, duck fat of duck, lard of pork, and tallow of beef.
But butter does NOT distinctly taste of beef, rather, it is reminiscent of slightly-aged milk (or, in the case of ghee, it may even strongly smell like certain kinds of aged cheese). There is, also, in butter, significant absorbed water content, and, to my palate, even a very subtle acidity that is not quite present in other rendered animal fats that give it a sort of brightness that make it work in things like butter-creams and other delicate or mild flavours (e.g. popcorn).
It is IMO this specifically "non-meaty" unctuousness that is the real draw of butter. Not some childhood nostalgia.
Wouldn't the preferred fat of a culture be spread between countries as they interacted then? Instead it has been fairly one directional with butter being adopted globally but other fats remaining niche (except Olive oil). Is that because of imperialism or is it because it is the best tasting one?
Today, I am one of the Ten Thousand [1] that learned you can make croissants with olive oil. Thank you for that! I've always assumed the laminated dough required solid fats, but apparently any layering of fat and flour can make flaky goodness. I am guessing that liquid fats are probably harder to work with, and croissants are already tricky enough to get right: but I must try.
As a kid I had both lard and butter on bread. Bras with lard and onions is amazing. But also that’s roughly the only combination of that works. Butter is way more versatile.
That, and the only readily available form of lard stinks of rancid hog.
Approximately nobody has access to high quality leaf lard like the food blogs champion.
Chefs use animal fats all the time. They think about cooking temperature, flavor, etc to make decisions.
Ever spread lard on toast? Do you prefer croissants made with lard? Is everyone's favourite dish these days lard chicken (I mean the Indian dish, not the Soul Food dish, which is of course popular in some locales).
Nope. Butter is favoured because it tastes unctuous. Nothing to do with Big Cow or any special interest lobby local to certain valleys in the USA. Except maybe Big Bacon Drippings, because if there's one thing better for a grill cheese than butter it's bacon grease (thick-sliced sourdough bread, sharp Cheddar cheese, a shmear of chili crisp)
Now, suet has been demonized to the point that nobody makes suet pudding any more. A shame, really.
> Butter is favoured because it tastes unctuous
Oily stuff tastes unctuous.
Butter is favored because most people had it in their youth. Some regions loves Nato and Chicken feet, others cheese and oysters. What's the most delicious? It depends of your own history.
I spread olive oil on my toast and prefer the croissants made with that as well. My favorite dish is fried tempeh.
Butter is NOT favored because most people had it in their youth, but because of its extremely distinct flavour.
"Unctuous" is certainly not specific enough, the reason butter (and ghee) is so delicious is its butteriness, i.e. it has a highly distinct taste. All properly rendered animal fats have highly distinct tastes and serve different purposes. Schmaltz tastes slightly of chicken, duck fat of duck, lard of pork, and tallow of beef.
But butter does NOT distinctly taste of beef, rather, it is reminiscent of slightly-aged milk (or, in the case of ghee, it may even strongly smell like certain kinds of aged cheese). There is, also, in butter, significant absorbed water content, and, to my palate, even a very subtle acidity that is not quite present in other rendered animal fats that give it a sort of brightness that make it work in things like butter-creams and other delicate or mild flavours (e.g. popcorn).
It is IMO this specifically "non-meaty" unctuousness that is the real draw of butter. Not some childhood nostalgia.
Wouldn't the preferred fat of a culture be spread between countries as they interacted then? Instead it has been fairly one directional with butter being adopted globally but other fats remaining niche (except Olive oil). Is that because of imperialism or is it because it is the best tasting one?
Today, I am one of the Ten Thousand [1] that learned you can make croissants with olive oil. Thank you for that! I've always assumed the laminated dough required solid fats, but apparently any layering of fat and flour can make flaky goodness. I am guessing that liquid fats are probably harder to work with, and croissants are already tricky enough to get right: but I must try.
[1]: https://xkcd.com/1053/
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I didn't say lard is always better. Different cooking styles demand different things.
Though my grandpa used lard on his bread in the great depression because they couldn't afford butter.
As a kid I had both lard and butter on bread. Bras with lard and onions is amazing. But also that’s roughly the only combination of that works. Butter is way more versatile.
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Excuse me? The trendiest of restaurants around me advertise that they have beef fat fried fries/potatoes.