Unsalted butter
Sweet-cream cow's butter · Dairy
Top 10 pairings
Unsalted butter is sweet-cream butter with no salt added — the "sweet butter" of the bakeshop and the default fat behind any recipe that simply says "butter." Leaving out the salt does two things: it lets the cook control the seasoning exactly, and it means the butter is usually fresher, because salt is a preservative and unsalted butter has nothing to hide a stale, oxidised flavour. It is the pastry standard for precisely those reasons.
Picking a good onedrag
Sweet, clean cream, kept tightly wrappedCheesy-sour or stale, or spotted with mould
Open and in useEveryday bestPregnant? The NHS says pasteurised butter is fine; avoid unpasteurised. Rewrap tight.
Wrapper and where it satRewrapped tight, back in the cold
Smell once unwrappedMilky and mild, but quieter
These cues are Butter's, and hold across its varieties; where this one differs, its own page says so.