Name: Salted Sage & Pepper Butter
Prep time: 5 min
Total time: 5 min
Yield: 1
Ingredients: 1 stick salted butter, room temperature; 1 teaspoon salt; 1/4 teaspoon black pepper; 1 tablespoon fresh sage, diced; 1 teaspoon fresh lemon zest*

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I love a good roast chicken, especially when the skin gets good and brown – you guys know that. One of the best tricks for getting a deliciously crispy skin on bird is to make sure you use some sort of fat to help.

And a really hot oven. Which for some reason frightens people. Don’t be frightened. My oven is typically set at 425°F when I roast a chicken, and then I cook the bird for about 20 minutes per pound. Baste with pan drippings a few times during the cooking process. Simple. SOME recipes call for an oven set at 500°F to start…but we’ll save that for another day.

When I roast a bird, I definitely like to slather the top with salt, pepper and olive oil – maybe some herbs, perhaps a little garlic salt.

But the crispy goodness and perfect seasoning under the skin, comes from slathering butter…well…under the skin.

You can use plain old butter. Boring.

OR, you can spice up your butter before you slather!

Salted Sage & Pepper Butter

Prep Time: 5 minutes

Total Time: 5 minutes

Ingredients

1 stick salted butter, room temperature
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 tablespoon fresh sage, diced
1 teaspoon fresh lemon zest*

Instructions

Add all the ingredients to a bowl and use a fork to combine them. The compound butter can be used immediately, or you can refrigerate it to use later!

Notes

Swap the sage out for your favorite herb (fresh parsley is yummy!), or blend a few together!

(Yes, that’s all. Sometimes it’s the little things that make awesome.)

*Here’s what happens when you try to work too late at night. You forget a crucial part of a recipe, and a faithful reader picks it out. Thank you, Molly, for wondering what the yellow stuff in the photograph was! The lemon creates such a lovely scent, I would’ve hated for you to miss out! The ingredient has now been added. Shew.

8 Comments

Life with Kaishon

August 22, 2011 at 9:06 AM Reply

That looks delicious : ).
I laughed about hot ovens scaring people. So funny!

Molly

August 22, 2011 at 1:35 PM Reply

That looks SO good. . . . But, am I missing something? What’s the yellow stuff in the photo? (Not the butter, obviously, but the stringy/flaky things on top of the butter?) Surely not part of the sage . . . ?

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August 22, 2011 at 1:49 PM Reply

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LIZA

August 22, 2011 at 2:12 PM Reply

Molly – you are SO right! Recipe has been updated to add LEMON ZEST. This is what happens when you attempt to write too late at night. Ha! Thanks!

Sally

August 23, 2011 at 3:49 PM Reply

Liza,
I stopped by your blog after reading your comment on another site about making Blogger “mobile-friendly.” Can you tell me more about that setting. I looked around, and didn’t see anything. Thanks so much.

p.s. This recipe looks SO yummy. May have to try this one. ~Sally

@Beth – Thank you!

Salted Sage & Pepper Butter