Butter Boards
Making butter... better?
Butter itself is not new. It’s been around for thousands of years. But now, it’s TikTok famous because of butter boards.
Food trends come and go. Dairy was out. Carbs were out. They’re both in again, apparently. Because butter boards are suddenly a thing. You take some butter, soften it, and spread it on a board. Add some toppings, and voila: a butter board. It’s a trend made by, and for, social media.
You don’t really need a recipe for butter boards. Just smear some butter around (artfully, of course) and top it with whatever ingredients strike your fancy – sweet or savory. After reading a bunch of articles about butter boards, and realizing I already had a lot of the required ingredients and tools at home to create one of the many variations on the trend, I decided to try it.
“Can I have a snack?” my son asked me one afternoon.
“I’m making a butter board!” I told him.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“It’s a TikTok trend!” I informed him.
He shrugged. He thinks the girls in his grade who are “obsessed with TikTok dances” are silly. I don't care much for TikTok myself. But this isn’t a dance – unless you consider a coming together of milk solids, or a comingling of complementary flavors and textures, to be a dance.
I let a stick of unsalted butter (I used the good stuff – it had a whimsical illustration on the package that said “raised on family farms” referring, presumably, to the cows pictured) sit out at room temperature for about an hour; then spread it on a slate board using an offset spatula. I drizzled honey over the butter and sprinkled it with some lemon zest (I own a microplane grater for zesting purposes), flaky sea salt, and a few red pepper flakes. I took a photo of my creation. It didn’t look quite as photogenic as some of the other butter boards I’d seen. Was it because of my decidedly un-fancy kitchen counter in the background? Maybe if I cropped the photo and applied a filter it would look better. I am clearly not a food stylist.
I had procured a loaf of crusty bread to eat with this zhuzzed-up butter. I presented the butter board and slices of bread to my husband and son. We tasted it.
“It’s fine,” said my son.
“I mean, it’s bread and butter,” my husband said. “I think I prefer a cheese plate.”
“It’s probably for the best that we don’t love this trend,” I told them.
“I do like to fit into my pants,” my husband said.
“Can I have something else?” my son asked.
“I’m always wary of new trends involving butter,” my husband said. “Remember the whole butter in coffee thing?”
He was referring to Bulletproof Coffee – a trend I also tried (verdict: buttery coffee is not for me) and had kind of forgotten about. I guess I’m always game to try a new use for butter. Fun fact: butter is naturally low in lactose.
So it’s back to the drawing board for me when it comes to putting things on boards or coming up with new, photogenic snacks. Maybe a different target audience would have appreciated the butter board more. Maybe the butter board would be better with a glass of wine, but what doesn’t taste better accompanied by a glass of wine? Sure, I could try more variations on the butter board trend, but as my husband pointed out, it still comes down to it being… butter. A butter by any other name – or presentation – is still butter. If you love butter, you’ll love butter boards. And if you’re “meh” on butter, maybe sit this one out. Your arteries will probably thank you anyway.