My wife D loves butter, the fresher the better. Our house is a margarine free zone. Okay, so we might both die of a heart attack, but we wont go blind.

There is something about the taste and texture of butter that just can't be replicated. It has a creamy unctuousness that no oil can match. When we want to spoil ourselves, we go to the Queen Victoria Market and buy fresh unsalted butter off a large block, that comes from Warrnambool, on the south west coast of Victoria. We buy a kilo (2 lbs) at a time and freeze it in conveniently sized pieces.

One day I was noodling around in The Essentials Of Classic Italian Cooking, when this recipe popped up, it seemed too easy to be true, but after cooking it once, it became a regular item on our table. It highlights the taste of butter and is ridiculously easy to make.

Tomato and Butter Sauce
(adapted from Marcela Hazan)

1 tin crushed tomatoes (800 g or 1.5 lbs)
1 onion, peeled and cut in half
75 g fresh unsalted butter
salt

Put everything except the salt in a saucepan and bring to a simmer. Cook for 45 minutes, remove the onion, season and mix with your favourite pasta. Is also good with gnocchi (kluski).

How easy is that?