Butter Bell - The Better Butter Dish
A few years ago we switched from margarine to butter. A variety of factors were at work. My husband discovered he had an intolerance to soy. Since he loves soy sauce and tofu, we decided to work on cutting out soy products he only liked instead of loved. I like to bake. Many recipes I use work better with sweet butter than with margarine. Additionally, back then consumers were starting to learn about the evils of transfatty acids in margarine, although recent margarine brands are getting better . Despite advances in margarine technology, we’re sticking with butter, but one of the big disadvantages of butter is how well it keeps at room temperature in the average butter dish. If you keep it in the refrigerator, it stays fresh longer, but then you have the spreadability problem. Our compromise was to keep it in the refrigerator when we weren’t using it, and trying to remember to take it out in time for it to soften up enough for spreading on toast or whatever.
Then we found ourselves watching the Food Network’s Unwrapped one night, and they featured the Butter Bell. We looked at each other and said, “We gotta get one o’those.” Quick, alpha-geek husband–to the internet!
In addition to online ordering, the site has a video and an illustrated guide to explain how the Butter Bell is used and how it works. We’ve used ours for about 2 years now, and it has indeed performed up to their promises and our expectations.
A few words on product selection: We ordered a model that came with a spreader, but we really haven’t used the spreader all that much. While the company recommends the spreader for use with packing the butter into the bell, I find that the back of a spoon works better. As for spreading butter, the spreader works as advertised, but an ordinary table knife will do the job. I’ve filed the spreader in the category of “things we’ll bring out when we have company.”
In short, a kitchen product that works as advertised, doesn’t cost an arm and a leg, and doesn’t take up a lot of space on the counter. Wow.
