Cooking with Butter...Creaming Butter and Sugar

Creamed butter and sugar using a stand mixer and flat beater with scraper edge  

I never knew that the phrase “Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy” caused so much angst among bakers.  We were taught this simple technique, the start of many cookie, cake and quick bread recipes, first by our Mom, and then in basic home economics classes.  We weren’t told why…just shown how it was done and how it should look.

Technically, creaming means mixing butter and sugar together on a moderately high speed until well blended, fluffy and pale yellow.   Now I realize it might have been the reason a cookie recipe that I used reliably sometimes wouldn’t come out quite the same.

If you look on line, you will find tons of advice, but I like the advice from both Land O Lakes and King Arthur…that pretty much agrees and gives me good results.

Three tools make this easier for me...a stand-mixer, a beater blade with a scraper edge, and an instant-read thermometer.

So here’s the method:

Bring your butter to a softened stage…room temperature is often too warm, no matter what recipe instructions say.  If you use an instant-read thermometer that’s between 58 and 65° F.   That’s a sure-fire way to make sure your butter is right.

Place softened butter and sugar into large mixing bowl.

Mix, using hand mixer or stand mixer on medium speed 1-2 minutes, or until butter mixture is pale yellow, light and fluffy. Use a rubber spatula to scrape the sides of the bowl once or twice while mixing.

Here’s the why:

Creaming evenly disperses the sugar throughout the batter, completely dissolving it into the butter.

You also increase volume by mixing thoroughly and incorporating more air into your batter. The result? Lighter textured cookies and cakes.

If I do it wrong?

Undermixed butter and sugar will look gritty and chunky. This can lead to dense cookies and cakes. It is possible to overmix the butter and sugar. If you overmix, however, the butter will separate out of the mixture and it will be grainy and soupy, so be sure to stop once your butter becomes light and fluffy.

Some recipes to practice with:

Apple Coconut Coffee Cake

Norwegian Butter Cookies