What do you use chocolate butter for?

Question

I was intrigued by chocolate butter in a Russian grocery store, so I bought 1 lb.   It appears to be butter with cocoa power incorporated in it.  What recipes would it be used in?  Baking I assume.

Nancy · Answer

Last thought - in effect, use this chocolate butter in a dessert cheese board...for actual dessert, or as accompaniment to drinks.
Here's a sample recipe:
https://damndelicious.net/2020/02/05/chocolate-and-cheese-board/

Nancy · Answer

PS More ideas. Here are some recipes - mostly desserts like muffins and cookies - using the chocolate tahini swirl.https://www.google.com...

702551 · Answer

That sounds pretty good although one would have to take care to keep the balance between the two as to not drown out the cocoa flavor.

Presumably one might get appealing results with other nut butters (almond, walnut, hazelnut, peanut, etc.) with the same caveat.

Having an entire pound of it provides some opportunity to experiment.

Nancy · Answer

One dish I've heard of (but not yet had) is to use some sort of chocolate butter swirled with tahini (paste) or halva (sugared sesame candy) to make a lovely dessert spread.
Use with cookies, fruit, toast, or some cheeses.
Or, the chocolate butter could be used plain (no sesame extras) with fruit.

702551 · Answer

I don't closely follow food trends and I had never heard of this so I enlisted the aid of a search engine (using the parameters "chocolate butter") and quickly found this Huffington Post article:

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/chocolate-butter-recipe_n_581b6cd5e4b0ba0d98fdce3c

that basically says it's just another compound butter, mostly intended for spreading on bread vaguely like Nutella. Compound butters usually aren't used in baking so this makes more sense.

Cocoa powder does have some chemical properties that can affect baking so unless a recipe called for that specific product the end results might be uneven. Note that there are different cocoas (regular and Dutch processed) with different pH levels, fat content, etc. which determine some of their differences when used in baked goods.

There weren't many search engine hits so I'm guessing that this is a pretty recent food trend and perhaps one that doesn't have a lot of traction.

For sure it certainly is not a common product that has been used in pâtisseries for decades otherwise it would be frequently mentioned in classic cookbooks.

Anyhow enjoy your chocolate butter!

What do you use chocolate butter for?

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