Andrew Rea (aka Babish) has become a culinary sensation thanks to his popular YouTube channel, Babish Culinary Universe, which has over 10.3 million subscribers. From teaching kitchen basics to recreating dishes from popular movies and series, Rea is always doing something fun in the kitchen.
Most recently, he partnered with the butter company Danish Creamery, which is known for giving their cows plenty of pasture space to roam and supporting sustainability initiatives to ensure the land remains fertile for grazing. We all know how to use butter in baking – and if you don’t, it’s easy to look at the cookbook recipe. But what other applications does butter have? And is there a place in the culinary cosmos where many home cooks (like me) don’t know how to properly use butter?
The answer is meat. We know butter for baking and butter for spreading, but when cooking meats, does butter have any use? I decided to ask Rea all my buttery questions and find out once and for all if this creamy ingredient might be the secret to cooking the best meats ever.
How to use butter to cook better meat recipes
For starters, I’d love to know your favorite way to use butter for different types of meats. What’s your go-to combos?
Babish: Butter-basting steak has gotta be my favorite example. There’s actually two things you can do. You can butter-baste, and then when it’s resting, you can rub the meat down with butter. It’s my secret for the ultimate steak. For turkey, it’s pretty commonly known to stuff butter underneath the skin. It prevents the meat from being exposed directly to the heat of the oven so it doesn’t burn, and it helps baste, brown, and flavor the bird, too.
For roasting turkey, is there a reason to choose butter over something else like olive oil? Or are they pretty interchangeable?
Babish: There’s a huge difference. With all types of fat, you’re going to notice a difference in flavor and behavior. Olive oil is definitely a great way to finish dishes, but many people don’t know that you’re not actually supposed to heat extra virgin olive oil. Extra virgin olive oil is unrefined to a point where it has lots of particulates in it that can denature and get bitter when they’re heated.
For the most part, olive oil is supposed to be used for finishing so it isn’t getting overheated. You absolutely never want to deep fry with it. It also has a very grassy, organic flavor that isn’t the best for turkey. It would give it a mineral-forward and grass-forward flavor, instead of that umami you want. For that, use butter.
I’d assume anything butter can do for turkey, it can do for chicken, too.
Babish: One-hundred percent. The roast chicken recipe in my cookbook is all about stuffing it with compound butter, which is basically butter with stuff in it. You mix herbs and spices in butter and then rub it underneath the skin of chicken or turkey. Not only does it protect the meat like I said before, but you’re adding fresh herbs and flavors right into the meat as well.
What about chicken breasts or thighs? I feel like most people aren’t buying whole chickens, they buy packages of specific cuts.
Babish: Chicken breast is really tricky, and it’s stunning to me that it’s the most popular meat sold because it’s actually really tricky to prepare, especially if you’re buying boneless and skinless. It’s one of the most unforgiving meats I can think of. You gotta hit it with a lot of heat really fast, but you can’t dry it out.
A breast is really thick so you need to butterfly it or pound it out. If you don’t, by the time you get the center cooked all the way, the outside will be dry as a rope. That’s why I normally recommend going for the bon-in, skin-on breasts. Because that helps insulate the meat during the cooking process.
Would you ever marinate meat with butter?
Babish: Not really. If you’re marinating, you’re probably going to be searing it after that. While butter likes high heat in some applications, with searing you’ll likely end up burning those butter fats and you’ll get bitterness.
The primary goal of marinating isn’t to introduce fats, it’s to introduce acid and salt. So it’s best to use vinegar, citrus, salt, and spices. Those will do a better job at deepening flavor and tenderizing. For meats, I think butter normally works best as a fishing move, like basting, resting, or adding it to a dish like pasta that has meat in it.
Are there any meat sauces you would use butter for?
Babish: Oh, there’s so many. Let’s say you’re making a bolognese or any kind of red sauce. Adding butter at the end is a huge upgrade. It heightens the flavor, brightens the color, and makes it creamier. It emulsifies right into the sauce perfectly.
A great one for chicken that I was working on recently is a French sauce called Beurre Blanc. You cook minced shallots in a bit of vinegar, then you lower the heat and slowly add pads of butter as you whisk. It’s like the butter sauce of your dreams. It’s labor-intensive, but it’s incredible.
Is there anything to know about butter that I haven’t asked?
Babish: I’ll say this: butter is one of the three main reasons restaurant food tastes so significantly better than what we make at home. The first reason is heat. Restaurants blast food with levels of heat that most home kitchens don’t even have access to. They have high-powered burners and commercial broilers. That type of heat being applied liberally and quickly is where a lot of flavor comes from.
The second is sauces. Restaurants put a lot of time, effort, and technique into making sauces. Sauces are actually really tricky; there’s a reason why it’s one of the most respected stations in a kitchen – the saucier – it’s an art.
The third is butter. Restaurants use copious amounts of butter in all kinds of things you probably wouldn’t imagine, including sauces. Sauces can end up being more butter than anything else. In fact, I’d say a vast majority of sauces I can think of are basically just some kind of very flavorful liquid that’s been boiled down and then bolstered with butter.
If I’m ever wondering how can I make this taste like it came from a restaurant? I’d say normally the question I’m really asking is how can I add more butter into this?
