Half Baked Ideas – Strange Margarine Spread

From time to time I post about my less than successful experiments in the kitchen. These are usually first tries and I’m always hopeful that I’ll come up with a better solution for whatever didn’t go quite right.

I recently tried a recipe that was supposed to be a way to make spread margarine or butter out of sticks of the same. The recipe said to mix 1/2 cup cold milk with 1 lb of butter or margarine and it would turn out just like the store-bought “soft margarine”. That sounded pretty easy!

Here's what happened when I tried making my own margarine spread

So I put four sticks of softened margarine in my mixing bow and mashed them just a little bit with the beaters of my electric mixer. I decided I should add the milk a little bit at a time. I poured in some of the milk and started mixing.

Well, the milk never did mix in! In fact the more I tried to mix, the more the milk just kept splashing all around and just would not incorporate into the margarine. I poured the rest of the milk in and kept trying, but had no luck.

I’m still a little baffled as to why this happened. Maybe butter would have worked better than margarine? It was a hot day and the margarine had been setting on the counter and was quite soft. Could it have been too soft? Maybe the milk was too cold? Very puzzling . . . .

If anyone has any advice on why this happened, feel free to share. Maybe I’ll give this one more try with real butter.

Update: Since first trying this recipe I have had better success with this homemade butter spread.

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3 Comments

  1. Marlene is on the right track

    If you want a butter spread
    1 cup softened salted butter (not margarine)
    3/4 cup grape seed oil or another healthy oil
    (Note olive oil will give it an olive oil flavor)

    Whip with mixer. Put into a container and refrigerate. It will seem runny at first.It will firm up. I use this all the time. If you want it even softer you can add up to a 1/4 cup more oil.

    From a health aspect: Mixing the butter with a healthy oil will lower the saturated fat content, and you will not be the getting trans fats from using margarine.

    I have really enjoyed your site. I love how you actually try these things. Not just re post things that aren’t worth posting in the first place.

  2. Are you trying to make the butter go farther or just soft to spread? The easiest way for spreadable butter is to use the “butterbell” principal which is basically to keep butter submerged in water at room temperature. I do this with just butter pressed into the bottom of a glass jar then covered with water and the lid. Refresh the water whenever you use the butter. Have heard that the butter will stay fresh for up to a month, but ours is usually gone before then.

  3. I'm wondering if it would have worked better with a “fat” like olive oil or canola. That doesn't help with the health aspects of it but would probably mix better and afterall isn't the spreadable stuff pretty much straight fat? Just thinking out loud! 😉 BTW….loving your blog! Lots of great ideas!