Echire Salted French Butter, 250g

Product Information

Its colour: The presence of carotenes, precursors of vitamin A, in the lush grass of the region’s pastures, produces the natural buttercup colour of our butter. The fresh spring grass gives it a bright yellow colour and a softer texture. Depending on the season, PDO Isigny Butter will therefore not have the same colour, which is a sign of fine quality. butter’s appeal lies in its delicate, creamy and distinct flavor – a recipe that has stayed true to its roots since 1894, made at the same independent dairy near the cities of Poitiers and La Rochelle in Western France. It contains more butterfat (82%) than normal butters and has a higher melting point. This trait makes it especially good for delicacies such as croissants or puff pastry, which need rolling out several times. Many companies from all over the world were freely using our name to sell their butter. In 1984, a number of producers and processors set up a trade union to defend the producers and processors of Isigny-sur-Mer Butter and Cream.

Butter is a relative latecomer to the artisan food movement compared with the boom in traditional breads and cheeses, where provenance and original production methods are major selling points.Many French butters are still made in accordance with the oldest culinary traditions. The production of Echiré butter in Poitou-Charentes, for instance, still includes the use of wooden butter churns ! These ancient tools give its delicate hazelnut flavour to this product, which holds a PDO (protected designation of origin) label. Over the centuries, the way in which we make our Butter has changed very little. The cream is churned to form small grains of butter, which are washed with pure water and then kneaded until a smooth texture is obtained. Handling of the butter is also kept to a minimum to preserve its quality. Having it handled and produced by hand helps lessen any damaging impact to the butter. The milk used to produce Échiré butter comes from 66 farms, all within a 50 km circumference. The cows enjoy the same grass and climate. With Échiré butter the area of origin is so defined, its flavour is traceable and distinct. Échiré is produced with a huge amount of care and attention to detail, but the fact that it is from a small area in France comes across when you eat it. You can taste the difference.

Use as is. This highly regarded butter is perfect for cooking, baking or even plainly spreading on your favorite bread.This butter is considered one of the best in the world. One Savuer writer admitted she loves it so much she’s had it “overnighted from a friend in Paris.” Bordier is a beurre de baratte, or butter produced using traditional French techniques including being “cultured, churned, then handled by two small wooden paddles.” Bordier butter is versatile, working overtime as a spread, an ingredient in baked goods, and as a browned base for pasta sauce. The milk is sourced from Brittany and Normandy, and Bordier butter is churned and kneaded by hand. The flavor is complex, encompassing salty, floral, earthy, nutty notes. One food writer perhaps put it best when he wrote on his blog, Churn Craft, that Bordier is “heavenly.” 5. Rodolphe Le Meunier

He prefers to buy his butter in massive slabs, because the less it is interfered with, the better it tastes. Butter should be kept in the fridge, he says. Storing it at room temperature may make it easier to spread, but just a few degrees' fluctuation will compromise the taste. When it comes to describing a cuisine, stereotypes are usually never welcome. But if there’s one widespread truth we know can confidently repeat when it comes to the French, it’s that they have perfected the art of cheesemaking. And so it should come as no surprise that another French dairy product, butter, is among the best in the world. The French love to start their day with some bread and salted butter. Their favourite lunch is often a Parisian sandwich. Also called a « jambon-beurre », this simple treat consists of a sliced baguette filled with ham and spread with butter. For dinner, it is common in France to serve fish with butter-sauce or mashed potatoes with hot butter. The proof, as they say, is in the pudding. Or in my case the starter, with which I first ate Echiré at the Delaunay restaurant in London last year. The butter was served in the form of a slim pat alongside a freshly baked, raisin-studded roll. It was unexpectedly delicious, outshining even the bread. I realised that for me, butter had become just something to spread on toast or to cook with, instead of a food in its own right.

To obtain this texture and the flavours that are so characteristic of our Isigny Butter, we carefully select the natural fermenting agents that give it all these qualities. These are the essential stages in making Isigny Butter: It all sounds very scientific, but most of the world's best pastry chefs – in New York, Paris and London – agree and prefer baking with Echiré. It contains more butterfat than normal (84 per cent compared with 82 per cent) and a higher melting point. This makes it more plastic and malleable; this is especially good for delicacies such as croissants or puff pastry, which need rolling out several times. Echiré comes both salted and unsalted. (Incidentally, salt was first added to butter purely as a preservative, but now many people prefer a more seasoned taste.) Either way, it is pale in colour: the very light yellow of primrose petals. Its texture is also firmer than normal butter, but suppler and not as greasy. This study made it possible to speed up the process of obtaining the prestigious French AOC label, with the butter finally being granted the European PDO in 1986. Our PDO Isigny Butter must therefore be produced within a precisely defined geographical area of 175 municipalities around Isigny-sur-Mer.