Brown Butter Is The Secret Ingredient Your Baked Desserts Are Missing

There's butter, and then there's brown butter. Each comes from churned-cream deliciousness, but the distinction in taste couldn't be further apart. That's especially true in baked goods. The best thing is that creating brown butter is simple, requiring only a pan, a few minutes, and the same butter you already have on hand. As the melted butter separates, and milk solids lightly caramelize in the bottom of the pan, you get rich, nutty, golden-brown butter that's transformative in many ways. 

Therein lies the magic. If you take some time to embrace the concept, that newly interpreted brown butter can redefine your personal baking mojo. Fortunately, we have some excellent ideas and recipes for using brown butter in baked goods. For starters, we gained some insight from a baked goods expert, Arielle Israel, co-owner of Black Box Bakery in Denver, Colorado. Noting the luscious nutty flavor that brown butter brings to the table, Israel reveals her own special application: Using brown butter in frostings and glazes. "You can put it in frosting and top anything with it!", she says. "We use it in our glaze for the brown sugar croissant monkey bread." 

Israel also suggests using it as a base for any recipe requiring butter. Experiment when making any of your go-to baked goods, or take some tips from Tasting Table recipe creators who've already tested, tried, and triumphed in the area of brown-butter baking.

Brown butter is a natural complement to brown sugar and chocolate, making it a no-brainer for chocolate chip cookies. Considered America's favorite cookie by many measures, the well-loved CCC has myriad interpretations. That includes this brown butter chocolate chip cookie by recipe developer Jennine Bryant. Using unsalted butter and mostly routine ingredients, her recipe carries a flavor depth credited to browning the butter for caramelized nuttiness. She also provides some insights on the butter-browning process, such as allowing the butter to foam up, and then removing it quickly when the sizzling stops. 

Then there's the cake kingdom, where experimentation is generally encouraged. There's even a cake dedicated to and named for the defining brown-butter ingredient. It's generally accepted that gooey brown butter cake originated in St. Louis, Missouri, but the version by recipe developer Kara Barrett goes easy on the chef. You can get things started with a basic cake mix, then infuse the gooey filling with earthy deep flavor from brown butter, dark brown sugar, and dark corn syrup. 

It's entirely possible to get that toasty brown-butter flavor into almost any cake creation, by way of the frosting. It can be a down-home chocolate cake or customized strawberry, coconut, or spice pumpkin cake — anything goes, as long as it has a butter-based frosting. This cardamom cake with brown butter frosting employs brown butter that's beaten until creamy, and is then joined by heavy whipping cream, confectioner's sugar, and a bit of kosher salt.