Beurre Composee

Polly was recently asked to comment on a recommendation in a new Debrett's guide, which said that it was OK to serve takeaway at a dinner party, provided you warmed up the china first. Our view on these things is that if you have time to warm china you probably have time to nip down the road and pick up the ingredients to whip up a lovely salad. Unless, of course, you're such a kitchen disaster that your friends will be glad to encounter a chicken jalfrezi instead of one of your own creations. 

Part of the reason we're not wildly tolerant of being invited round for a takeaway is that it's so easy to cheat your way into giving an excellent dinner party. And no, we don't mean quietly stashing M&S ready meal containers out of sight, we mean the simple things that add instant interest. One of our favourite tricks is serving flavoured butters, or beurre composee if you're feeling particularly posh.

Most people associate flavoured butters with garlic bread, fish dishes and steaks, but they actually mix remarkably well with almost anything. And, in common with the infused spirits we talked about the other week, butter can be flavoured with pretty much any combination of ingredients.

Making flavoured butters is super simple.  Leave your butter out on a worktop until it gets to a nice, pliable ambient temperature (we all know the private hell that is trying to cream rock hard butter). Cube it into a bowl, soften up a little with a fork, add your ingredients and mix well. This can also easily be done in a mixer. Once your butter is well mixed, shape it into a block / sausage / whatever you like, roll in cling film and refrigerate until firm but not solid. Then either serve as is, in curls or slices OR - as shown below - use biscuit cutters to form pretty shapes. You can also make up slices/curls/shapes in advance and pop back into the fridge for later. 

The longer this butter sits, the better it tastes, so try to make it at the start of the week for use over the weekend. Serve with any course to add an extra punch of flavour.

Some of our favourite beurre composee flavours include: marmalade, brown sugar and cinnamon, chilli garlic and pepper, rosemary, rocket and parmesan... the list goes on. 

Ottolenghi reccommends always having anchovy butter in the fridge in this recipe for Sprouting Broccoli with Anchovy and Smoky Crumbs, while Jamie Oliver recommends flavoured butters on steamed vegetables and Diana Henry has some zingy butter combinations for barbecued sweetcorn.

Happy buttering!