How A Vegetable Peeler Can Help Easily Spread Butter In Just A Swipe

Spreading butter when it's room temperature requires hardly any effort, but when it's cold and hard, it's a different story. The problem is that butter is only guaranteed to be safe at room temperature for a maximum of two days, according to the USDA. If you keep your butter in the fridge, sure, it'll be safer, but it won't be ready to spread at any moment's notice — unless of course, you have a vegetable peeler.

While you can soften a stick of butter by microwaving it for a few seconds, or even by covering it with a warm empty glass, the extra step isn't exactly convenient, not to mention it can often result in melted butter instead. A better way to go about it is to use a vegetable peeler. Simply shave off the top layer of the stick, and you should have a thin piece of butter that will be spreadable as soon as it comes in contact with a warm piece of toast or whatever food you want to butter.

If you're only using it to peel vegetables, you may not notice the difference between a swivel peeler and a y-peeler. After all, both are equally effective at accomplishing the same thing. If you're peeling butter, however, it's best to use a y-peeler. These peelers, identifiable by their letter y shape, have blades that are sharp on both sides rather than just one, unlike a swivel peeler. This makes them useful for shaving other foods like chocolate and cheese, and most importantly butter.

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Cold Butter Hack! How have I never thought of this before? USE A PEELER! #butter #lifehack #kitchentricks #todayyearsold

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A swivel peeler does work reasonably well on regular quality butter, TikTokers have found, but a y-peeler is a must if you buy high-fat or European butter. Because of how soft it is, as one Redditor discovered, this premium butter is a lot harder to peel without getting it stuck in the blades. A sharper peeler therefore is necessary for cleaner, fully intact butter shavings.

If your peeler is too dull, or you don't have a y-shaped one for your high-fat butter, you don't necessarily have to resort to the microwave. You can just as easily use a cheese plane on your butter instead, which works almost exactly like a peeler. Just run the cheese plane over the top of the butter, and a perfectly thin, spreadable slice will form.

Another kitchen tool usually reserved for cheese, a grater, can also make your cold butter spreadable. All you have to do is grate your butter directly over your food, just like you would with cheese. Alternatively, you can use a fine mesh sieve. Scrape the top of the butter with it, and it'll immediately soften for easy spreading.

Buying a special tool, like a heated butter knife, is also an option, but there are plenty of ways to contend with cold butter just by using the tools you already have on hand.