Cream, and salt if it's salted. Some unsalted butters add 'natural flavoring', so salted butter often has the shorter label.
Foil or coated wrappers keep fridge smells out better than plain parchment.
Buy a pack dated 4 to 6 months out. Flavor differences mostly disappear in baking.
Butter
Land O Lakes Salted Butter
Two ingredients: sweet cream and salt. Recommended in America's Test Kitchen's salted and unsalted butter tests, where its coated wrapper kept off-flavors out.
1 lb, 4 sticks
Find on AmazonWorth knowing
- The unsalted version adds natural flavoring.
Ingredients
Sweet cream, Salt.
What we ruled out
Butter wrapped in plain, uncoated parchment. Tasters linked plain parchment to stale and sour off-flavors in both salted and unsalted tests.
Horizon Organic Unsalted Butter. Last of seven in America's Test Kitchen's unsalted test, with stale flavors tasters linked to its parchment wrapper.
Also good
Challenge Butter. Its unsalted butter won America's Test Kitchen's unsalted test, and the salted one is only cream and salt.
Lurpak Slightly Salted. The winner of America's Test Kitchen's salted butter test, and the only cultured butter in it.
Sources
- The best salted butter, America's Test Kitchen (2014)
- The best unsalted butter, America's Test Kitchen (2018)
- Butter, Challenge Dairy (2026)
- Unsalted Butter, Land O'Lakes (2026)