A simple dinner.

[Dunc]

Egg pasta noodles with butter and Parmesan cheese shredded.

[SheltieLover]

1. Sounds delic, Dunc!

I loooove egg noodles & butter.

Enjoy!

[SheltieLover]

2. Have you ever tried browning the butter?

For some reason, if you do so, it tastes a bit like lobster.

[Dunc]

3. Never tried them that way.

Now I must look this up.

[SheltieLover]

4. I discovered it quite by accident

Useful cranial flatulence moment.

Enjoy!

[Morbius]

5. Good stuff.

Myself, I'd add some minced garlic to the butter and some finely chopped fresh parsley at the end if available.

One can make great food with simple fresh ingredients.

[Dunc]

6. I never thought of that.

Next time if i remember i will add some garlic thank you.

[heme]

7. This sounds really good

I may to try it,, I can cook basics, the one thing I have trouble with, is waiting for water to boil. I'm an impatient soul.
And can I add? I love tuna, I would add some tuna in.

[JHB]

16. Same (about waiting for water to boil, that is)

My solution was to fill up a whistling tea kettle, put it on the burner, and do something else until it started sounding off. Then, pour the water from the kettle to the pot I was using. On the one occasion I needed more than one kettle's worth of water, I just set the pot to simmer, filled up the kettle again, and repeated the process.

[Lulu KC]

19. Brilliant! Stealing tonight. NT

[LetMyPeopleVote]

20. Welcome to DU

[irisblue]

8. I learned how to make a brown butter sauce for pasta by accident

I was sauteing (real stick) butter with minced garlic, low & slow, so no burning & there was a major crash in the living room. The dog & 1 cat ran past me; I left the pan unattened on the burner for maybe 2 minutes, it was nicely browned when I got back.

Now what kind of butter you use? I but kerrygold 2 sticks package maybe once a month, more often if popcorn gets involved.

[heme]

9. Brown butter?

What's that? What's the difference between what I buy at grocery, which is unsalted butter, what's brown butter? I use unsalted Walmart real butter. It's not brown.

[irisblue]

11. Slightly carmelized butter, low & slow cooking w/you watching the.pan

https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/how-to-brown-butter/


What Is Brown Butter?
Brown butter (buerre noisette) is a classic French staple in the kitchen. It’s melted butter with an accelerated flavor brought on by gently cooking it. It’s a one-ingredient wonder, vastly improving any dish or recipe where it’s used. In less than 10 minutes, butter sizzles, foams, and gently cooks into a nutty and caramelized flavored ingredient you can use as a sauce over pasta, meat, or vegetables; or in dessert recipes like brown butter sugar cookies, brown butter apple blondies, and brown butter pound cake.



More there

[heme]

12. Ok ty,

Maybe later, I'm still figuring out noodles

[ProfessorGAC]

14. It Adds A Great Flavor, But...

Last edited Sun Jun 7, 2026, 07:49 PM - Edit history (1)

...you really need to watch it. It goes from nicely browned to burnt pretty fast.
The browning is different than simple carmelization (which only requires sugars & butter only has a trace amount of sugar as lactose) because it involves the Maillard reaction. That involves the milk protein in the butter.
Once the moisture is gone we have 100% butterfat at quite high temperature so we toast/fry the milk solids, which is mostly a protein called casein.
Just like high heat turns the surface of meat dark brown on the grill, the protein denatures and begins to oxidize.
Changes the flavor profile dramatically.
Sorry to go so tech. I'm DU's friendly neighborhood organic chemist

[JHB]

17. And boy, do we love you for it.

[heme]

10. I'm sorry, I'm new here

And at my age, I'm trying to learn how to cook, sorry if I ask too many questions

[irisblue]

13. Welcome to DU, nice to meet you. We are for ALL levels of cooking

[JHB]

18. Oh, I feel ya on that one

"OK, I can read what the definition of 'simmer' is, but when I'm there at the stove, what's it supposed to LOOK like?"

Four years ago I made my first from-scratch vegetable soup, and I was like Tom Hanks in "Castaway" crowing "I have made fire!"

That thread:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/1157112160

[surrealAmerican]

15. There's nothing wrong with ...

... buttered noodles.

When I was a kid, my mother would frequently make "noodles with pot cheese" - buttered noodles with cottage cheese - for lunch. It's a basic comfort food.

[Trueblue Texan]

22. Gotta try this one.

Thanks, surrealAmerican!

[Trueblue Texan]

21. My simple dinner like that ...

...is large macaroni noodles cooked until tender, but not mushy. Add a stick of butter or a little less and a can of chopped tomatoes. Salt and pepper to taste. Total comfort.