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Recipe · Smoked · Easy

Cold-Smoked Butter and Salt on the Kamado, with Beech Sawdust

Two pantry staples in a single cold-smoke session, with the charcoal unlit: unsalted butter on ice and flaked salt in a thin layer, with the chamber at 25 °C and never above 30 °C.

Quick answer

With the kamado cold and unlit, light a bed of beech sawdust on the charcoal grate. Above, put unsalted butter in 2 cm cubes on a tray over ice and flaked salt in a thin layer. Chamber at 25 °C, never above 30 °C: butter is done in 1-2 h, salt in 2-4 h. Rest in the fridge.

Porción de mantequilla cremosa y dorada con escamas de sal gruesa por encima, sobre una pequeña tabla de madera redonda con mango y cordel, en una mesa de tablones oscuros junto a un paño blancoSave to Pinterest
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Prep
20 min
Cook
240 min
Servings
8 servings
Temperature
25 °C

Ingredients

  • unsalted butter, fridge-cold250 g
  • flaked salt100 g
  • beech sawdust for cold smoke, as much as the generator spiral takes1 carga
  • ice cubes: 500 g in the tray and the rest kept in the freezer1 kg
  • tea light, to light the sawdust1 ud
  • country loaf (hogaza) or sourdough, for tasting1 ud

The gear for this recipe

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Method

  1. 01

    Check the thermometer outside

    The butter sets the day: it softens above 20 °C and the generator adds some heat inside the dome. An hour ahead, leave one ThermoPro TP17H probe outside, in the shade. If it already reads 20 °C or more, the butter will start to soften before it takes the smoke: better at night or first thing in the morning. The ceramic must be completely cold; if the kamado was used the day before, it still holds heat. On the Costa Blanca, there is usually a window from November to April.

  2. 02

    Prepare the butter and salt

    Cut the 250 g of butter, cold, into 2 cm cubes and spread them in a single layer in a metal tray of around 15 cm, the cubes almost touching and not stacked; if you prefer to grate it, do so straight from the fridge. Return it to the fridge for 30 minutes while you set up the rest. Spread the 100 g of flaked salt in another dry tray or plate of 15 cm, in a thin layer a few millimetres deep.

  3. 03

    Light the sawdust

    Load the spiral of the Weber 17636 base with grillart beech sawdust up to the rim of the channel and level it with a spatula, without packing it. Bring a tea light flame to the end of the channel and take it away as soon as the sawdust smokes. Check outside for a few minutes that the thread of smoke keeps going, then lower the base onto the charcoal grate, empty and ash-free, pushed to one side, as the guide asks, so the smoke rises next to the trays.

  4. 04

    Set up the chamber

    Fit the cooking grate of the Kamado Bono Media. On one side, a tray with 500 g of ice and, resting on top, the butter tray. On the other side, the salt, as far from the ice as possible. Leave air between the trays and the edge. Fix the ThermoPro probe with its tip in the air at grate height, next to the butter. Close the dome: bottom vent at 1 cm, top vent half open.

  5. 05

    Watch the first hour

    Hold the chamber at 25 °C. If it climbs past that, swap the melted ice for the ice in reserve and pour the water away from the salt. Above 30 °C, open the dome; if it does not drop, stop and take the butter to the fridge. If the smoke comes out white and dense, open the bottom vent a little more, as the bitter smoke guide explains. Every 30 minutes, stir the salt with a spoon.

  6. 06

    Take out the butter

    At one hour, taste a cube on a piece of bread: it should taste of clean beech smoke, with no bitterness. If it needs more, leave it up to 2 hours at most, tasting every half hour. Take it out earlier if the cubes lose their edges or shine with fat. Once out, cover it and put it straight in the fridge; close the dome again at once so the salt does not lose its smoke.

  7. 07

    Finish the salt

    The salt carries on alone, stirred every 30 minutes, for a total of 2-4 hours. Taste it from the 2-hour mark: the flake takes on a toasted colour and a smell of smoke you notice when you open the dome. When you like it, take it out and let it cool and dry in the air for a few minutes. Store it in a dry glass jar, tightly closed, away from humidity.

  8. 08

    Salt and rest the butter

    With the butter at kitchen temperature for a few minutes, mash it in a bowl with a spatula and add half a teaspoon of the smoked salt, or more to taste. Shape a cylinder with baking parchment, roll it tightly and close the ends. One night in the fridge spreads the smoke and softens it. Keep it wrapped in the fridge and treat it as an opened butter: use it soon and never past the use-by date of the original.

About this recipe

This is one of the simplest smokes in the recipe collection, and it does not use a single ember of charcoal. On a cool afternoon the unlit kamado acts as the chamber, a spiral of beech sawdust provides the smoke, and you end up with two things that keep well in the larder and the fridge: smoked butter to finish a piece of meat or spread on bread, and flaked smoked salt for everything else. Both fit in the same session, side by side, and both are far more forgiving than a cheese or a salmon. Wrapped nicely, they also sort out a Christmas present.

Why unsalted butter

The recipe uses unsalted butter, and the reason is on the other tray. The salt smoked alongside is there to salt the butter at the end, to taste and with the same smoke, instead of adding the factory salt, which you cannot control, to the salt you add yourself. That keeps the result coherent: one smoke, one salt and an amount you decide in the bowl. If you would rather spread without thinking, half a teaspoon per 250 g is a starting point; whole crunchy flakes on top of a slice of bread are another option that needs no mixing.

Two trays, two rhythms

The cold-smoking guide works with two figures: 25 °C as the target and 30 °C as the ceiling. Here the butter is in charge. It starts to soften above 20 °C and melts at around 32-35 °C, so it warns you before any other food: if the cubes lose their edges or shine with fat, the chamber is running too warm. That is why it sits in a metal tray on top of another tray of ice, which draws heat from underneath. Salt, by contrast, is indifferent to temperature. Its problem is humidity: it pulls water from the air and cakes, so its tray stays dry and away from the ice, whose meltwater raises the humidity in the chamber.

The times run separately. The guide gives, as a guideline with no official source, 1-2 hours for the butter and 2-4 hours for the salt, which is stirred so the smoke reaches every flake. The butter comes out first and the salt stays in. Taste every half hour: only your palate knows how much smoke you want.

The unlit kamado, set up for cold smoke

In a 51 cm kamado such as the Kamado Bono Media, the 44.5 cm cast-iron grate (a figure from the brand's spare-part data sheet) takes two 15 cm trays side by side, with plenty of air around them so the smoke can circulate. Underneath, on the empty, ash-free charcoal grate, pushed to one side, goes the Weber 17636 base, the 20 x 20 cm spiral loaded with grillart beech sawdust. Beech is among the mild woods in the guide to woods for smoking, and a dairy fat takes up smoke readily: a strong wood would turn it into an ashtray. With the dome closed, the bottom vent stays at one centimetre and the top vent half open, the same settings as the cold-smoked cheese. The ceramic must be completely cold, and everything is done outdoors, because sawdust burning without a flame in an enclosed space gives off carbon monoxide.

The dome gauge goes blind at these temperatures. One probe of the ThermoPro TP17H, with a range from -10 °C, goes with its tip in the air at grate height, next to the butter, and gives the ambient temperature of the chamber; another, outside and in the shade, tells you before you start whether today is possible. If it goes well, you now know how to read the smoke and the probe, and the cold-cured and smoked salmon is the next step.

In 30 seconds

With the kamado cold and unlit, set the beech sawdust base on the charcoal grate, with the bottom vent at 1 cm and the top vent half open. Above it, put 250 g of unsalted butter in cubes on a tray over ice and 100 g of flaked salt in a thin layer, away from the ice. Keep the chamber at 25 °C and never let it go above 30 °C. Take the butter out after 1-2 h and the salt after 2-4 h, stirring it every half hour. Salt the butter with its own smoked salt and leave it overnight in the fridge.

Editor's tips

  • Salt absorbs humidity from the air and from melting ice. If it comes out a little caked, spread it on a plate for a few hours somewhere dry before putting it in the jar, and do not store it next to the coffee machine or the sink.
  • Grated instead of cubed, the butter has more surface and takes up smoke sooner: start tasting it at half an hour. Put it on baking parchment in the tray so you can lift it out without it clumping.
  • For a Christmas present, wrap the butter cylinder in baking parchment, tie it and add a small jar of smoked salt. Write on the label that the butter goes in the fridge, that it should be used soon, and the use-by date of the original butter.
  • A slice of smoked butter on a freshly rested chuletón (Spanish bone-in rib steak), or a few flakes of smoked salt on a pan de cristal (a very thin, crisp, open-crumbed loaf) with tomato, are the most direct uses.

Gear for this recipe

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  • Kamado Bono Media 51 cm

    Kamado Bono Media 51 cm

    For cold smoke you do not need a big kamado, but a sealed ceramic box with two vents that keeps the smoke still around the food. In the 51 cm Kamado Bono Media, the 44.5 cm cast-iron grate, according to the brand's spare-part data sheet, takes two 15 cm trays side by side with room to spare: the butter on its ice on one side and the salt on the other, with air between them so the smoke can pass. Below, the charcoal grate takes the 20 x 20 cm base, pushed to one side. That day it is not lit: the ceramic must be completely cold, and with the bottom vent at one centimetre the smoke circulates slowly.

    €923

    View on AmazonRead review
  • Weber Base de ahumado en frío, Negro, 20 x 20 x 3 cm (vista 1)

    Weber 17636: spiral cold smoke generator base, 20 x 20 cm

    With no lit charcoal, the smoke has to come from something that barely heats, because butter softens above 20 °C. The Weber 17636 base is a 20 x 20 cm tray with a spiral channel that is filled with sawdust and lit at one end with a tea light: the ember advances slowly and gives off a thread of smoke with very little heat. In this recipe the session is short for the butter, 1 to 2 hours, and somewhat longer for the salt, up to 4; Weber speaks of smoke for hours without giving a fixed figure. Check that the charcoal grate of your kamado takes 20 x 20 cm.

    €40

    View on AmazonRead review
  • grillart Premium Harina de haya – 3 kg – ideal para fumar en frío – 100% madera de haya natural (vista 1)

    grillart beech sawdust 0.5-1.0 mm for cold smoking, 3 kg

    The base spiral needs fine sawdust, not chips or pellets. The grillart beech sawdust has a grain of 0.5 to 1.0 mm according to its data sheet, which recommends it for cold-smoke generators; pairing it with the Weber base is a deduction from grain size, not a declared compatibility. Beech is a mild wood with a sweet, discreet smoke, and that matters with butter: dairy fat absorbs smoke readily and a strong wood would leave it tasting of ashtray. On the salt, the same mild smoke leaves a toasted background that does not mask what it seasons. The 3 kg sack covers many loads.

    €30

    View on AmazonRead review
  • TempPro TP17H Termómetro para carne Termómetro digital para cocina,4 sondas (vista 1)

    ThermoPro TP17H: 4-probe wired thermometer, -10 to 300 °C

    In this recipe the deciding figure is low, 25 °C as the target and 30 °C as the ceiling, and the dome thermometer does not read it. The ThermoPro TP17H has four corded probes and a declared range from -10 °C, so a December afternoon does not leave it blind. Two work here: one with its tip in the air at grate height, next to the butter, which is the one in charge, because the butter warns you before the salt does; and another outside, in the shade, which tells you before you light the sawdust whether today is possible. The probe sits with its tip in the air, not touching the tray, or it would read the temperature of the metal rather than the chamber. It reads on the screen, no app.

    €36

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FAQ

  • How do you make smoked butter at home?

    With the kamado unlit and the sawdust smoking underneath, cold butter goes in 2 cm cubes on a metal tray, and that tray on another one of ice that draws heat from underneath. Chamber at 25 °C and never above 30 °C, because butter softens above 20 °C. The sign to take it out is the cubes losing their edges or shining with fat; otherwise, 1 to 2 hours, tasting every half hour, and a night's rest in the fridge.

  • Salted or unsalted butter for smoking?

    Unsalted, if you are also smoking salt. Unsalted butter takes the smoke just the same and lets you salt it at the end with your own smoked salt, to taste and with the same beech smoke. With salted butter you add the factory salt to the salt you add yourself, and it is easy to overdo it. Half a teaspoon of smoked salt per 250 g is a starting point; you can also leave it unsalted and put whole flakes on top when serving.

  • How do you make smoked salt?

    Spread flaked salt in a thin layer on a dry tray and cold-smoke it for 2 to 4 hours, as a guideline, stirring every half hour. Salt is not cooked or spoiled by heat, and AESAN (the Spanish food safety agency) lists it among the foods in which listeria cannot grow, which is why the cold-smoking guide starts with it. It does absorb humidity, though: keep it away from the ice and, at the end, in a dry, tightly closed glass jar.

  • How long do you cold-smoke butter?

    Between 1 and 2 hours as a guideline, with no official figure, with the chamber at 25 °C and never above 30 °C. Grated, it takes smoke sooner than in 2 cm cubes. Taste a piece on bread at one hour and then every half hour: it should taste of clean smoke, with no bitterness. Straight out of the smoker, the smoke tastes harsher; a night wrapped in the fridge spreads it and softens it.

  • How long does homemade smoked butter keep?

    Treat it like opened butter: wrapped and in the fridge, use it soon and never beyond the date on the original. There is no official figure for the homemade kind, and cold smoking does not replace the cold of the fridge, so it goes in as soon as it comes out. The smoked salt, by contrast, keeps in a dry, tightly closed glass jar, away from humidity.

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