Our Test Kitchen’s Favorite Butter Is Hiding At Dollar General
The trusted brand is good for both cooking and baking.
We've written at length about the Southern Living Test Kitchen's favorite butter. It's the one brand we use to test all of our recipes, both savory and sweet. Land O'Lakes checks all the boxes we look for in a good quality butter : It has an unmatched consistency and is widely available. To the latter point, you can't beat how broadly distributed this butter brand is; from Publix to 'The Pig', you'll see it stocked across the South and the nation. We were surprised to recently learn that it's also at many Dollar General stores too.
Why Our Test Kitchen Prefers Land O'Lakes
In efforts to ensure that our recipes work for a wide variety of readers across the South and country, we have to consider what most folks have access to at their local markets. Although European-style butters have become increasingly popular and more widely stocked, for most of our readers, classic American-style butters like Land O'Lakes are what their dairy aisles are filled with.
From brand to brand, however, American butter varies. Not just in flavor, but also in consistency and color. To mitigate variables when testing and developing our recipes, we stick to one reliable brand in the Test Kitchen for everything from a roux to chocolate chip cookies , and for us, that's Land O' Lakes. It has the rich flavor and perfect creamy consistency we want from butter in our recipes.
Where To Find Land O'Lakes Butter
We also consider what brands our readers have access to when creating recipes. With Land O'Lakes available in all 50 states, we can count on everyone being able to find it. Although the brand has roots in Minnesota, the company grew to become one of the largest co-ops in America, and now operates in 60 countries.
Large chains like Walmart or Target always have it on shelves, so do speciality stores like The Fresh Market, but it's also found in many Dollar General locations. In Birmingham, where Southern Living is based, not every Dollar General has the butter, but many have both two-stick packs and the standard four-stick packages in stock, as well as both unsalted and salted varieties.
Credit: Caitlin Bensel; Food Stylist: Torie Cox
Our Best Butter Recipes
There are plenty of recipes on our site that use butter, but here are a few of our favorites that highlight the kitchen staple:
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