Whether you’re dropping a dollop in your frying pan, spreading it on your toast, or measuring up for baking, butter is a versatile pantry mainstay for most of us. But soaring prices also mean butter is living up to its growing reputation as “yellow gold”.
In a non-scientific survey, Seven Sharp found prices for a 500g block of butter ranged from $6.49 to $9 — a third more expensive than this time last year, according to Stats NZ.
Dairy Companies Association of New Zealand executive director Kimberly Crewther said butter prices in New Zealand are determined offshore.
“The Global Dairy Trade (GDT) auction is one of the ways that the global price [of butter] is set. At the GDT auction earlier this week, the price for butter was 47% higher than it was in August last year,” she said.
“Farmers are facing higher energy prices, and fertiliser prices have been at above-average levels, and New Zealand farmers have been experiencing higher interest rates as well.”
Butter alternatives
With butter at a premium, some consumers are either doing without it or, as cooking personality Annabelle White suggests, looking for butter alternatives — but what are they?
White is a butter believer but says you can successfully swap it out with something else, depending on the recipe.
“The really good thing is that there are lots of alternatives to using butter,” she told Seven Sharp. “You can do all sorts of things.”
Avocado, pureed apple, pureed pumpkin and a blended tin of beans can all be substituted for butter.
White says they won’t have the same texture or mouthfeel as butter, but they will work with some experimentation.
According to White, a good rule of thumb is 3/4 cup of vegetable oil to one cup of butter or half a cup of Greek yoghurt to one cup of butter.
Sometimes, it just has to be butter — especially when you’re frying and want to add flavour.
“You use oil [in your frying pan] for flash-point, which you obviously need, and a little bit of butter for flavour. Everything tastes better with a little bit of butter.”
How you store butter is also a factor. “Please don’t leave it freewheeling in the fridge; cover it. The butter needs to be covered in the fridge because it picks up the taints of other food, like onions,” explained White.
“If you make a chocolate cake, it will taste like onion,” she said.
Butter can also be frozen. White recommends cutting butter into small blocks and storing it in freezer bags for easy use.
As they say, the proof is in the eating of the pudding — or, in this case, the cake.
White tested her popular banana cake recipe for Seven Sharp, a recipe which calls for canola or vegetable oil instead of butter.
The verdict? Delicious.
And, if substituting avocado or a blended tin of beans for butter doesn’t work, you could always try making your own butter.
