Buttered Noodles

[tielan]

I've heard about this mythical 'buttered noodles' but I have never experienced it. Never. No, not ever.

My 'simple noodle' recipe is anchovy garlic crumbed noodles with parmesan and lemon. Yes, I know! This is why I'm asking about buttered noodles!

Anyway, I'm intrigued about the prevalence of buttered noodles throughout the DW world. Please answer and feel free to direct others of your persuasion here.

Poll #23306 Buttered Noodles?

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 19

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Where are you from? (Where did you grow up? Be as specific or unspecific as you want.)

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Are buttered noodles a thing where you are from?

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Yes
15 (78.9%)

No
2 (10.5%)

Buttered what?
2 (10.5%)

Apart from butter and noodles, what goes in buttered noodles?

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cheese
8 (66.7%)

garlic/alliums
3 (25.0%)

white wine
0 (0.0%)

tomatoes
0 (0.0%)

sage, parsley, oregano, or some other herb
1 (8.3%)

something(s) else which I shall detail in the comments
4 (33.3%)

Would you use margarine or lard or another oil in buttered noodles?

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Yes, I can be flexible.
7 (38.9%)

No, butter all the way!
8 (44.4%)

Hell, no, why would you do that?
3 (16.7%)

buttered ticky box

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butter!
9 (56.2%)

moar butter!
5 (31.2%)

Ticky box!
5 (31.2%)

Tickety butter!
8 (50.0%)

the only way to eat peanut butter on white bread is with butter y/y
1 (6.2%)

If you want to leave your best recipe for buttered noodles in the comments, please do! I mean, I imagine it pretty much amounts to:

1. boil noodles until cooked
2. cut off wedge of butter and add to noodles
3. stir
4. eat

But just in case it's more complicated than that...hit me up. I'm curious.

Comments

[dragonlady7]

For the record, I've never heard them called "buttered noodles". It's just that it was sometimes a side dish. The wide egg noodles, not like, spaghetti. Mom rotated through her Basic Starches with various meals and if it wasn't plain white rice with butter, or baked potatoes with butter, then it was egg noodles with butter.
Although, I had sort of blocked this from my mind, but i grew up eating margarine and it was only when I was a young teenager that my mom read a study that margarine was bad and also we were a little wealthier by then, so she started buying butter and at first I thought butter was gross and wouldn't eat it! So I guess all those memories of my childhood, were really of margarine noodles. Ew!!

[tielan]

Ah, the marketing of the 80s. Polyunsaturated fats all the way!!

Butter has always been my thing, to the point where my mother would pointedly ask if I was eating crumpets with a bit of butter, or butter with a bit of crumpet. Even now, I consider one of the signs of adulthood being able to cut a chunk of butter from the pat and just eat it, without having to look over my shoulder to see if my mum is coming. :D

[dragonlady7]

My niece loves butter to about that extent. She'd eat a whole stick if we let her. I just didn't grow up with it! Now I can't stand margarine but I remember that it used to taste to me like butter does now.

I love that definition of adulthood, LOL

[unicornduke]

I usually did it as a kiddo when I didn't want to eat what mom was cooking. I hated like, fish sticks so I'd usually make the pasta and stick some butter on instead of eating those. Eventually I upgraded to frozen ravioli and put butter on them.

[tielan]

Having not been a picky eater since the age of, oh, three, and never having had children, I am fascinated by the avenues parents take in order to nutrient up their offspring.

And, as a perennial butter fan, I must say that 'buttered noodles' certainly sounds up my alley when I Can't Even.

[unicornduke]

I'm only picky about certain foods due to texture and I hate them to this day, like fish, tomato chunks, lettuce. Things like that. But I loved fruit and certain vegetables back then too so I would happily eat those so the rare occasions like fish sticks were the only time I would eat butter noodles, which is probably why mom was fine with it.

I sometimes make butter noodles as an adult if I'm out of energy and need to put something in me and I actually put seasoning or other things on it, which my parents definitely didn't do because they didn't even salt foods. I've been teaching myself to cook more and different things and actually use spices. I still end up having issues eating mildly spicy foods so I'm working on that too lol

[dragonlady7]

Oh, fried noodles is a variant my dude learned to make as a teenager-- he would take leftover spaghetti or penne or elbows or anything really (though generally not egg noodles, they don't hold up well enough), or would cook some fresh, and then put it in a frying pan with butter, salt, and some herbs, maybe soy sauce, and eat that. Usually in his case it was between meals because he went through a phase where he was incapable of consuming enough calories to sustain his growth, not because he couldn't/wouldn't eat what his mom cooked.
I feel like it's in a separate category from butter noodles but it's similar to this application-- like, a fill-in food when everything else is too hard. The frying adds some cool texture and flavors though!

[unicornduke]

Oh definitely something different. Buttered noodles are used again by sticking a pad of butter on cold noodles and then microwaving it until the butter is melted. It does sound like a decent idea though

[conuly]

Buttered noodles CAN include pepper and some sort of herb, or cheese, or bits of ham or pancetta, but at their core they're salt, noodles, butter.

Olive oil makes an acceptable substitute.

If you're going to add garlic or onions you'd have to cook the garlic or onions first, and at that point you've dirtied too many dishes.

[edenfalling]

There's always garlic powder or a jar of pre-minced garlic if you're going the low-effort route. :)

[conuly]

It's still too bitey and strong.

[edenfalling]

Alas! They work for me, but everybody's sense of taste is different.

[tielan]

I was thinking that you take the noodles out of the pan and set aside, turn the heat up and saute the garlic/onions in the butter before pouring the lot on the noodles.

And I forgot the salt! Query: is butter in the US pre-salted? Do you get salted and unsalted butter?

[edenfalling]

Butter in the US can be salted or unsalted; you have to check the packaging to make sure which you're buying. Generally speaking, people use salted butter as "table" butter. Unsalted is strictly for baking, unless you're on a low-sodium diet.

But I add some extra salt to my noodles anyway, for flavor. :)

[conuly]

You can purchase salted or unsalted butter in the US. We usually purchase salted.

[edenfalling]

I mean, you can use olive oil for cooking the noodles, and I guess it would work as a butter substitute in a pinch, but yeah, the basic idea is 1) cook and drain noodles. 2) apply butter and salt. 3) eat.

I add garlic because I really like garlic, but that's not how my mom did made them in my childhood. She used buttered noodles as a sidedish, because they're not terribly nutritious; her preferred noodle type was elbow noodles because they're cheap and don't flop around. When I make them, I usually use store-brand frozen cheese-and-spinach ravioli so as to pretend I am being slightly less unhealthy.

But they are totally a comfort food. :)

[tielan]

Truthfully, the point at which I reach for pasta/noodles tends to be the point at which I have basically given up on 'nutritious'. :D

And, yeah, all the comfort food, all the way.

[senmut]

Boil to al dente (I prefer small type noodles for this) and drain
Olive oil is my preference, but butter or margarine works
Oregano and basil and thyme, sometimes garlic, plus parmesan cheese

Serve while warm.

[tielan]

Sounds good!

I just had breakfast and now I want buttered noodles for lunch...

[zooey_glass]

Ive answered yes to buttered noodles being a thing, but we would never call them buttered noodles. In the UK, noodles is only used for Asian varieties of noodles. The Italian type, which is what I mean when I say buttered noodles is referred to as pasta (general) or spaghetti (specifically the long thing spaghetti). I would actually describe the dish in question as pasta with cheese - in my world the cheese is the main flavouring, but in the absence of snother sauce I would also put butter on (or actually, Flora margarine). And the cheese should be a strong but slightly melty one, like cheddar, not a very hard cheese like parmesan.

Now I'm craving pasta and cheese for dinner. Mmmm.

[tielan]

See I'm Australian of Chinese ancestry, and I agree that 'noodles' are the Asian version of noodles while 'pasta' is the Italian one. However, the dish appears to be American in nature and 'Buttered Noodles' is the common term which I used because otherwise the Americans wouldn't get what we were talking about.

In America, too, Asian noodles are almost universally 'ramen', so far as I can tell.

Also, I'm not thinking of pasta with cheese - which is 'macaroni cheese' (even if the pasta in question isn't macaroni) - so far as I can tell it's just...butter on pasta.

[conuly]

I wouldn't call it buttered noodles if it was spaghetti, but I would if it was egg noodles or maybe butterflies.

[bladespark]

My baby sister was picky, in a "total list of maybe ten foods" kinda way, growing up, and while we always made buttered noodles with a little parmesan, she wouldn't eat them that way, it was just noodles and butter and nothing else, and she nearly lived on that through her childhood.

You can get buttered noodles at a particular restaurant I really like here, (Noddles and Co.) and they're wide egg noodles with just butter. But we usually made them with spaghetti, just because that's what was in the house.

[tielan]

In my head, 'pasta and butter' = 'buttered noodles', rather like 'pasta and cheese sauce' = 'macaroni cheese', even if the pasta is not specifically macaroni. ('Elbow Cheese' just sounds weird. And kind of gross.)

I've heard about someone eating out at a place that serves buttered noodles; I guess it's like 'fish and chips' or 'nuggets and chips' options for kids - something that they're likely to eat while the parents have slightly fancier food...

[honigfrosch]

My parents made buttered noodles to use up leftovers. You take the cooked noodles from the previous day, put them in a pan with butter (or oil), and fry them with some bacon.

[tielan]

Mmmm...bacon.

Welp, I know what I'm having tonight! :D

[eggsbenedict]

I had never heard of this either and found a recipe on the Women's Weekly website. O_O It uses egg noodles, butter and pepper and is tagged as Modern Australian, curiously enough. It also sounds like cacio e pepe, which is not a bad thing!

My simple noodle recipe growing up was to make 2-minute noodles on the stove, but add peas, corn and a sliced-up frankfurt when it's boiling. I fully admit I'd still eat that if I was home alone and cbf.

(I was going to switch to another icon and then I realised how appropriate my default one was!)

[tielan]

Cacio e pepe - oh, of course!

And yes, 2 minute noodles With Things In. I wonder if that's an Aussie thing, a Sydney thing, an Asian background thing, or just A Thing...

Curious question, your two seem pretty adventurous for kids (but then I usually see them when they're out and in a good mood), what do you do when they balk at food? Are there things that they just won't eat? Do you fight that fight?

[eggsbenedict]

Probably just A Thing! I remembered after reading your comment that there's a ridiculous Final Fantasy XV quest to get ingredients to put on top of your Cup Noodles.

Hahaha I was so close to making buttered noodles tonight!! Y wouldn't eat tonight's pasta once my dad unveiled his not-very-traditional pasta sauce. I usually don't fight too hard over dinner, they'll often reject stuff if they've eaten a lot during the day, but I usually try to get them to eat at least something before they leave the table and if they really don't touch anything then we don't bother with dessert.

...I guess I'll make cacio e pepe with the leftover pasta/noodles tomorrow...

[tielan]

Does your family do lunar new year? Or was that what tonight was?

[eggsbenedict]

Nooo, we don't really do anything for it apart from going to nearby council events, but I do suspect my mum leaned on my dad to make something noodly for good luck - she did that to me on New Year's Day.

[ninja007]

My mom would just cook spaghetti and put butter on them. Just butter. They taste wonderful. It was something easy and fast she could cook that she knew we would love.

PS: I'm allergic to cheese. I know, I know. How can an Sicilian be allergic to cheese?? Just am. Always have been. It's the bacteria they use to age cheese. My body won't digest it.

[tielan]

It's the bacteria they use to age cheese. My body won't digest it.

I'm so sorry! (I love cheese.)

I guess I'm curious. My mother's 'easy dinner' was instant noodles (ramen noodles) with thin strips of SPAM (yes, spam ham), and lettuce leaves stirred into the soup until they were soft. Mind you, my sisters and I were never picky eaters. In fact, half the time the problem was making us STOP eating!

[ninja007]

If we didn't like something, we would run from the table. Mom cooked corned beef hash once. My dad said we could leave the table and not eat it, but we couldn't have anything else. We bolted. Worst meal I ever saw her make.

[thothmes]

I’m late to the party as has become my way these past two years! Too much real life, but that’s a good thing.

In my experience (mileage may vary) here in America there are two strains of buttered noodles commonly meant under that term. There is the Germanic form (egg noodles, butter) which has two forms, tossed and served, and tossed and then baked with breadcrumb topping until browned. Parsley can be added at the tossing stage if you are feeling fancy, and cheese, perhaps cheddar, may be added to the breadcrumbs. Sour cream can be added with the butter too. Then there is the Mediterranean form, pasta noodles tossed with butter and Parmesan cheese. This may have olive oil substituted, and garlic, white wine, and fresh (rather than cooked) tomatoes could well be added, although cooked tomatoes could also be substituted, but that is wandering into more elaborate pasta sauce territory than is generally meant by buttered noodles. Herbs can also be added, generally parsley, oregano, or fresh basil.