If you find a recipe that calls for cooking spray, you may be wondering if you can swap it for butter. Not everyone wants to buy expensive sprays that need to be thrown away, and which have lots of different ingredients in them.
Can you use butter instead of cooking spray? You can often use butter instead of cooking spray, but it will depend to some degree on the recipe. Butter has a lower smoke point than cooking spray, so if you are trying to fry at high temperatures, you will need to choose a high temperature fat for cooking. For lower temperatures, however, butter should be fine.
Can You Use Butter Instead of Cooking Spray?
You can usually use a smear of butter instead of a spritz of cooking spray. This is one of the oldest and most traditional methods for greasing tins and pans, and it will lend a deliciously creamy, salty flavor to your food. However, you do need to pay attention to smoke points when choosing your fat.
The smoke point of an oil or fat is the temperature that it can be heated to before it begins to smoke and burn. Oil that has burned tastes terrible and is also thought to release dangerous carcinogens into the food, so it’s important to choose a fat that has a high smoke point if you are going to cook at high temperatures.
The smoke point of cooking sprays will vary depending on the brand, but tends to be between 325 degrees F and 520 degrees F. By contrast, butter has a smoke point of around 302 degrees F.
Because it has a relatively low smoke point when compared with cooking sprays, you should be careful when swapping cooking spray for butter in recipes that require high temperatures. Frying on the hob, air frying, or roasting in a very hot oven can be problematic if you want to use butter.
However, if you aren’t using high temperatures, you will usually find that butter can be swapped for cooking spray with no issue whatsoever. Butter also has a better flavor than most cooking sprays, so many people prefer to use it.
Is Butter Healthier Than Cooking Spray?
There are pros and cons to both butter and cooking spray, and which you should use depends on your priorities. A lot of cooking sprays contain additional ingredients because these are needed to make them spray. On the other hand, you can use a lot less fat when cooking with a spray than if you are using butter.
Cooking sprays often have propane or butane in them to propel the oil out of the can. They may also contain things like soy lecithin and dimethyl silicone. These things are all considered food safe, but you may not want to add them to your diet, especially if you are trying to eat minimally processed foods.
Butter is therefore a good alternative in this way, but it has its own disadvantages. For example, when you use butter, you will inevitably end up using more fat, because it’s hard to get a thin, even layer when you aren’t spraying it. If you’re trying to reduce your fat intake, this can be an issue.
Secondly, butter has more flavor than cooking oil. This can be an advantage if you want the flavor, but it can also cause problems in recipes where you want other tastes to shine through.
For example, butter isn’t great for roasting vegetables or meats in, but it can work well for greasing tins when you are baking and making cakes.
Butter is also higher in calories than most cooking oils, so be aware of this if you are trying to cut back.
How Do You Use Butter Instead of Cooking Spray?
Butter is very easy to spread, which makes it a great alternative to a spray. All you need to do is smear some butter onto some parchment paper, and then rub this around the tin or tray that you wish to grease. If you are greasing a frying pan, simply place it on a warm ring and then swirl the butter across the pan once it has started to melt.
If you are greasing a tray with butter, use the parchment paper to spread it out thinly so that you don’t get a thick, greasy layer. If you are using melted butter, you can take a pastry brush and spread the butter with this instead to thin it out. You will then have an even coating.
Is Butter Cheaper Than Cooking Spray?
This will depend a little on the brands that you buy, but often, butter is cheaper than cooking spray. The manufacturers do not have to produce a can that is capable of spraying, and they don’t need to add the extra ingredients that are necessary to keep the oil in spray form. Butter can simply be wrapped in paper and placed in a fridge.
Butter is often cheaper, and many people prefer it for this reason. If you are cooking on a budget, using a smear of butter to grease your pans and baking trays will cut costs when compared with an aerosol of cooking spray.
Does Butter Change the Cooking Process?
In general, cooking in butter is similar to cooking in oil, but it sometimes takes slightly longer. Butter takes a little while to melt, which can result in a slower cooking time, and may mean that you need to give your recipe a few more minutes than you would if you used cooking spray.
This isn’t a reason to avoid butter, as it is likely to make minimal difference overall, but you should bear it in mind so that you can adjust your cooking times if necessary.
Final Thoughts
Butter is a good substitute for cooking spray, and has been used to grease trays, pans, and baking tins for centuries. However, if you are going to cook at very high temperatures, you may need to choose a fat that has a higher smoke point so that it doesn’t burn.