Stick of butter

A stick of butter is the standard way butter is sold and measured in the United States. One stick weighs 113 g, which is 4 ounces, ½ cup or 8 tablespoons. Four sticks come in a 1 pound box. Outside the US, butter is usually sold in blocks of 250 g or 200 g, and recipes give grams instead of sticks.

How to do it

To measure part of a European block without a scale:

1. Unwrap a 250 g block. It is about 125 g per half.
2. Cut it in half for about 1 stick plus 1 tablespoon.
3. For 1 stick (113 g), cut a 250 g block into 9 roughly even slices and use 4 of them, which is close enough for cooking.

For baking, weigh it.

How to use it

Sticks	Grams	Cups	Tablespoons
¼ stick	28 g	2 tablespoons	2
½ stick	57 g	¼ cup	4
1 stick	113 g	½ cup	8
1½ sticks	170 g	¾ cup	12
2 sticks	227 g	1 cup	16
4 sticks	454 g	2 cups	32

The wrapper on a US stick is marked in tablespoons, so you can cut off what you need. For a European block, use a kitchen scale. A 250 g block is about 2¼ sticks.

Sticks differ in shape. Butter sold in the eastern US tends to be long and thin, and butter sold in the western US is shorter and fatter. Both weigh the same.

Common mistakes

• Using a whole 250 g block where a recipe says 1 stick. That is more than twice as much.
• Using salted butter when the recipe says unsalted. A stick of salted butter holds about ¼ to ½ teaspoon of salt, depending on the maker. Cut the added salt if you swap.
• Mixing up "1 cup butter" and "1 stick butter". One cup is two sticks.
• Measuring melted butter by volume when the recipe wants a stick. Weigh it, or melt the right amount after cutting it.

In recipes

You will see "1 stick (½ cup) unsalted butter, softened", "2 sticks cold butter, cubed" and "½ stick butter, melted". British and European recipes say "125 g butter" for roughly the same as a stick plus a tablespoon.