Buttered bread or toast is simple and delicious, but nothing is worse than reaching for the butter from the fridge only to find it’s too cold and hard to spread. 

Sure, you can pop the butter in the microwave for a few minutes, but you risk melting it too much (which also renders it unusable if you’re making your favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe). And leaving it out on the counter isn’t an option when you need it ASAP. There are several hacks to soften butter in seconds, but the latest one is the most clever one yet, and possibly the least messy.

While this hack isn’t necessarily new, it’s currently trending once again online, and we think for good reason. Vital Farms recently posted about this on Instagram: “This nifty little hack for turning fridge-cold butter into soft, spreadable butter in seconds.” TikTok user roxy.369 says this is a “life hack” that’s worth trying.

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