Premise 1: Butter goes good with toast.
Premise 2: Toast goes along with coffee.
Conclusion: Butter goes good in coffee.
I wrote a while ago about an experiment in which I tried peanut butter in some coffee. It turned out pretty well. I’ve since tried it with all-natural peanut butter, with similar results (I still haven’t solved the sludge- on- the- bottom problem though). So I figure, why not get rid of the peanuts and try it with pure butter? Note: I usually think of things like this when V is at work, and thus not around to tell me not to do stupid things.
I Googled “butter in coffee” first, to see if this is commonly done and/or if any poisonous chemical reactions would take place. I found this dude, who was apparently emboldened to try peanut butter in his coffee after seeing my last experiment’s post. He liked it too. Nice. But apparently butter, minus the peanut, is not commonly put in coffee (though I found one recipe, linked below).
Being brave and manly, I went on and did it anyway. I put just a bit of butter – I’d say a teaspoon or so – in a mug, added sweetener (wouldn’t want to drink anything unhealthy!), poured some hot chocolate-tinted coffee over it, then added cream. It took a moment to melt, then left a bit of an oily film on the coffee. Weird.
How did it taste? Good, of course. The butter gave the beverage an added richness. With the chocolate also in the coffee, I would describe it like drinking a chocolate chip cookie. With coffee. In fact, I’ll call this recipe “chocolate chip cookie coffee”. That’s copyright 2007, me, so if you use it you have to pay me lots of money. Thanks.
I’ll let you have a free trial though, and I do recommend trying it. Unlike the peanut butter coffee, there is no gross sludge to worry about, and it seriously does taste good. And come on, a teaspoon of butter won’t clog your arteries too much.
See also: Food Logic Volume 2: Peanut butter coffee.
Also see also: Hot buttered Jamaican coffee.
Phronk.com 
Comments
49 responses to “Food Logic Volume 3: Butter + Coffee”
This is the funniest post.
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This is the funniest post.
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Um… no. I already get too much fat /carbs in my diet.
Don’t you have a new healthy combo?
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Um… no. I already get too much fat /carbs in my diet.Don’t you have a new healthy combo?
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wow, my teeth are stinging just thinking of this. Novel idea though… but yeah. wow… You made me feel whoosy by the description.
(Also, nice use of the word “emboldened”!!)
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wow, my teeth are stinging just thinking of this. Novel idea though… but yeah. wow… You made me feel whoosy by the description.(Also, nice use of the word “emboldened”!!)
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You guys don’t know what you’re missing out on.
And yeah, emboldened is an irreproachable word.
(my thesaurus assures me that means something)
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You guys don’t know what you’re missing out on.And yeah, emboldened is an irreproachable word.(my thesaurus assures me that means something)
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so long as we are talking about REAL butter, then by all means.
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As opposed to what? Body butter? Yeah, I’d keep that shit out of coffee.
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As opposed to what? Body butter? Yeah, I’d keep that shit out of coffee.
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Nutella. Hell yeah.
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Nutella. Hell yeah.
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I remember two things about butter+coffee.I heard Jesse James drank it like that.I remember reading a story about a man who went to see his in-laws in Africa and he said they drink coffee with a spiced butter in it.
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I remember two things about butter+coffee.I heard Jesse James drank it like that.I remember reading a story about a man who went to see his in-laws in Africa and he said they drink coffee with a spiced butter in it.
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Yep. Been drinking butter in my coffee since the 90’s. Nice.
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Yep. Been drinking butter in my coffee since the 90’s. Nice.
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Just a few minutes ago I made myself a cup of coffee and THEN discovered I was out of milk in the fridge. Rather than run to the store I thought, okay, what’s the best approximation to cream in my apt. right now.Peanut butter occurred as a possibility – and I see that people DO use this in coffee – but butter, being a dairy product, seemed even closer, so I tried it.The melted butter rises to the top so it seems like you’re mainly drinking butter at first, but it’s pretty good. Still prefer milk or cream though.
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Just a few minutes ago I made myself a cup of coffee and THEN discovered I was out of milk in the fridge. Rather than run to the store I thought, okay, what’s the best approximation to cream in my apt. right now.Peanut butter occurred as a possibility – and I see that people DO use this in coffee – but butter, being a dairy product, seemed even closer, so I tried it.The melted butter rises to the top so it seems like you’re mainly drinking butter at first, but it’s pretty good. Still prefer milk or cream though.
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My Sicilian grandmother always put a pat of butter and eggshells in the grounds before brewing. Never understood the why but loved the outcome. According to “highly reliable” internet sources (see google) the eggshells either remove bitterness or settle the grounds (in the event your grounds are riotous). I highly recommend this but not with the grind-n-brew variety of coffeemaker.Cheers
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My Sicilian grandmother always put a pat of butter and eggshells in the grounds before brewing. Never understood the why but loved the outcome. According to “highly reliable” internet sources (see google) the eggshells either remove bitterness or settle the grounds (in the event your grounds are riotous). I highly recommend this but not with the grind-n-brew variety of coffeemaker.Cheers
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Wow, never heard of eggshells (and not sure why grounds need settling), but maybe it’s worth a shot. Thanks for the input everyone!
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Wow, never heard of eggshells (and not sure why grounds need settling), but maybe it’s worth a shot. Thanks for the input everyone!
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riotous coffee hahahaa. I’ve heard of salt in coffee too. Anyway, I just tried added half teaspoon of butter, half teaspoon of golden sugar to a glass and pulled two shots of coffee into it too. It was rich and delicious and I think (as a coffee enthusiast) that it should be an official coffee drink.
One should note that a half teaspoon of butter is surely much less than the amount of fat in a large specialty coffee.
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riotous coffee hahahaa. I’ve heard of salt in coffee too. Anyway, I just tried added half teaspoon of butter, half teaspoon of golden sugar to a glass and pulled two shots of coffee into it too. It was rich and delicious and I think (as a coffee enthusiast) that it should be an official coffee drink.One should note that a half teaspoon of butter is surely much less than the amount of fat in a large specialty coffee.
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I should mention that in the beginning of your post the logic you refer to is transitivity of the relation “goes good with”. Let # be “goes good with”, you are saying that if a#b and b#c then a#c. This falls apart with things like honey, ham and iced cream, since ham doesn’t mix well with iced cream. Nevertheless it was a cute opener 😀
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I should mention that in the beginning of your post the logic you refer to is transitivity of the relation “goes good with”. Let # be “goes good with”, you are saying that if a#b and b#c then a#c. This falls apart with things like honey, ham and iced cream, since ham doesn’t mix well with iced cream. Nevertheless it was a cute opener 😀
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Mmm, with golden sugar sounds wonderful. I’ll have to try that.
I went into the logic a bit < HREF="http://phronko.blogspot.com/2007/09/food-logic-volume-5-coffee-maple-syrup.html" REL="nofollow">here<>. No, the transitivity doesn’t ACTUALLY hold true, but it looks reasonable enough on the surface that it can lead to tasty food experiments. 🙂
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Mmm, with golden sugar sounds wonderful. I’ll have to try that. I went into the logic a bit here. No, the transitivity doesn’t ACTUALLY hold true, but it looks reasonable enough on the surface that it can lead to tasty food experiments. 🙂
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heh, since you are so active, I submitted your post to tastespotting.com with a picture of some coffee, butter and sugar :). if they approve you’ll get extra traffic.
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heh, since you are so active, I submitted your post to tastespotting.com with a picture of some coffee, butter and sugar :). if they approve you’ll get extra traffic.
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That’s very kind! Thanks!
I actually have a whole other blog on this topic, < HREF="http://www.puttingweirdthingsincoffee.com/" REL="nofollow">Putting Weird Things in Coffee<>, if you’re curious about other coffee explorations.
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That’s very kind! Thanks!I actually have a whole other blog on this topic, Putting Weird Things in Coffee, if you’re curious about other coffee explorations.
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I love the way you shlep in a coupla' teaspoons of fat, but then wimp out about adding some sugar: “wouldn't want to drink anything unhealthy!” What's healthy about artificial sweetener?
Anyway you're a bit off the pace – looks like they were doing this in the fifties:
http://www.archive.org/details/VerySpecialCoffee
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I love the way you shlep in a coupla' teaspoons of fat, but then wimp out about adding some sugar: “wouldn't want to drink anything unhealthy!” What's healthy about artificial sweetener?Anyway you're a bit off the pace – looks like they were doing this in the fifties:http://www.archive.org/details/VerySpecialCoffee
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I saw this done on a Korean tv show called Iris. While in Akita (Japan), a Korean man drinks and gives a Korean woman coffee with butter. And not like a teaspoon but more the size of 4 teaspoons cut in one piece from a block of butter.
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I saw this done on a Korean tv show called Iris. While in Akita (Japan), a Korean man drinks and gives a Korean woman coffee with butter. And not like a teaspoon but more the size of 4 teaspoons cut in one piece from a block of butter.
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Same with anonymous…
But I saw this in earlier Korean Dramas/movies…
So I searched google and tried to find posts with people drinking coffee with butter in it…
None but this blog! But when I searched through Korean websites, I found quite a few.
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Same with anonymous…But I saw this in earlier Korean Dramas/movies… So I searched google and tried to find posts with people drinking coffee with butter in it…None but this blog! But when I searched through Korean websites, I found quite a few.
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Just today on What Do You Know (on NPR), the guest was Andrew Zimmern (the host from that show where he eats really gross foods all over the world), and when asked what the grossest thing he'd ever had was, he said coffee with butter, and described that it was unexpectedly horrible, etc etc. It seemed odd to me that it would be so terrible, but maybe he had it without cream and sugar, or maybe he's just not a coffee guy.
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Just today on What Do You Know (on NPR), the guest was Andrew Zimmern (the host from that show where he eats really gross foods all over the world), and when asked what the grossest thing he'd ever had was, he said coffee with butter, and described that it was unexpectedly horrible, etc etc. It seemed odd to me that it would be so terrible, but maybe he had it without cream and sugar, or maybe he's just not a coffee guy.
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Hey, and there's this guy:
http://www.bulletproofexecutive.com/how-to-make-your-coffee-bulletproofand-your-m
I feel more manly just reading his description!
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Hey, and there's this guy:http://www.bulletproofexecutive.com/how-to-make-your-coffee-bulletproofand-your-mI feel more manly just reading his description!
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Butter in the coffee is a tradition in some parts of northern Sweden.
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Butter in the coffee is a tradition in some parts of northern Sweden.
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Just tried it with salted butter and a tiny sprinkle of cocoa. Amazing!
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Just tried it with salted butter and a tiny sprinkle of cocoa. Amazing!
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It is common in Asian areas, with cold winters, to use butter in their coffee, as the oils in the butter along with the warmth of the coffee help maintain body heat and lengthen the amount of time moisture is held in the body.
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It is common in Asian areas, with cold winters, to use butter in their coffee, as the oils in the butter along with the warmth of the coffee help maintain body heat and lengthen the amount of time moisture is held in the body.
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