One friend of ours is an absolute fiend for butter mints. Since we were visiting him recently, we picked up a pack of them to give him as a treat, and of course they rapidly disappeared. But that got me to thinking: how hard would they be to make?
As it turns out, not hard at all.
The recipe is actually super easy, but they take a lot of drying out to solidify the way you’d want them to. In fact, mine are going on two days as I write this post, and they’re still fairly soft. I’ve had the AC running since it’s been very hot out, so there’s not much humidity in my house, they just take a long time to fully dry out.
The smaller you make the mints, the more you’ll make, and the less time they will take to solidify.
When they aren’t solid, they’re basically like dried-out buttercream icing. It’s a soft texture that certainly isn’t unpleasant, it’s just not the slightly-crunchy sugary texture of store-bought mints, at least not right away.
A few notes about this recipe.
- I tried to make them about the size of store-bought mints and ended up with about 160 mints. The exact number you’ll make depends on how big you make them.
- Food coloring is entirely optional. One drop of color makes a light pastel, two for a more robust color, and three for a more vibrant tone. My pictures are a batch using three drops.
- Since powdered sugar is difficult to measure volume-wise properly, I chose to weigh it. My recipe below is about four cups, but it’s more reliably measured as 480 grams of powdered sugar.
- Use peppermint extract. Peppermint oil can work, but it’s a lot more concentrated and it’s hard to get the subtle flavor in a batch this size.
All in all, it’s still very easy to make these mints. The hardest part is waiting for them to dry out without just eating them all!
Classic Butter Mints
Equipment
- Stand Mixer
- Baking Sheet Or other tray to dry them on.
Ingredients
- ½ Cup Salted Butter Softened
- 480 Grams Powdered Sugar Weighing is more reliable; see post for details.
- 1 Tbsp Half and Half
- 1 Tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1 Tsp Peppermint Extract
- 2-3 Drops Food Coloring Optional
Instructions
- Add the butter to your stand mixer and beat it smooth.
- Add the sugar, half and half, vanilla, and peppermint extracts and beat on low until it's crumbly.
- Add in your food coloring. I divided the batch into thirds and uses three drops of color for each, beating them until it was well-mixed, then removing it and repeating with the other colors.
- Sprinkle a flat surface with powdered sugar like you're dusting with flour, and roll out your mint dough into a long, thin log. Pretend you're a kid making snakes out of play-doh.
- Cut the mints into the size and shape you want, and arrange them on your tray to dry out. Leave these exposed to dry for at least 24 hours, or as long as you want to get the texture you prefer. The exact time will vary depending on your location, weather, and time of year!