Roasted Garlic, Basil and Lemon Butter

 

Hello my Dear Wonderful Readers!

I am sure you have all been those nice, quiet Italian cafes /restaurants that give you an array of breads with dips before you get your glass of wine or starter? I love those places that are not stingy when it comes to doling out that gorgeous creamy dip! It wasn’t until recently that I found out that you could totally make it at home. I know it looks fancy but it is The most simplest thing ever.

That dip is just basically butter and a variation of herbs and spices. So, this post is about how to make a simple roasted garlic, fresh basil and lemon butter. These compound butters are really easy to make and if you have the ingredients you can make any type of butter – savoury or sweet. I will share more recipes with you, but for now let me tell you how to make this incredibly easy and delicate yet lovely butter. I served mine with a zucchini, red bell pepper basil frittata the other day but you can use it as you like. For the sake of the photo, I did not wait for mine to get to room temp. These were straight out of the fridge.  You can wait for them to get to room temperate and enjoy them with breads, bread sticks, pita bread, pita chips, french fries and even carrot sticks.

Ingredients  :-

1. Table Butter – 200 gm
2. Garlic – 8 cloves
3. Fresh Basil – one hand full
4. Lime – 1

 

Instructions :-

1. Bring the butter to room temperature
2. Mean while roast the garlic cloves in a pre heated oven at 200 C for 45 mins or till you see the garlic turn to dark brown
3. Zest the lime and chop the basil leaves roughly
4. In a large bowl combine the butter, lime zest and basil leaves
5. Now simply pinch the end of the garlic pod for the flesh to pop out from the other side ( see am not peeling garlic skin!!!)
6. Now using a whisk, mix all the ingredients well to evenly distribute the ingredients through the butter
7. Lay a parchment paper over your counter top ( 30 cm X 30 cm)
8. Spoon the butter mixture towards the side of the parchment close to you. Make sure you leave  at least 10 cm from the edge of the paper to the mixture
9. Now slowly curl the paper inwards, around the butter mixture to make a long log
10. Continue till the other end of the paper. Then tie up the sides with a piece of string ( should look like a large toffee)
11. Finally pop it into the fridge to set for an hour
12. When you are ready to use the butter cut them into small discs and let them come back to room temperature
13. Or you could use them just like that on a hot pieces of toast! You can see how the butter melts and leaves these small specks of green on the trail!