The Best Butter In The World
Tracking down who makes beurre Bretel, the nostalgic Vietnamese favorite.
My mom in law (from Toronto) spent some of her time here with me in San Francisco trying to negotiate for a crate of Bretel butter from a guy in LA who sells it by the pallet, for about $10 per can. The butter is a French import into Vietnam that Vietnamese people RAVE about, but no one in France has heard of it.
Some of the cans arrive dented, and my mom in law wonders if maybe this butter is not in production anymore, and the world’s remaining supply is sitting in a warehouse somewhere, slowly dwindling away. A commenter on Reddit wonders the same thing:
“I suspect that the exporter is no longer in business. That further leads me to suspect that any Bretel still available for sale is expired old stock. I would love to be wrong about that.”
Some internet research reveals this fascinating article about the significance of canned foods in Vietnamese culture, that explains the origin of the butter.
“The butter in question originally came from Maison Bretel Freres, a butter company established in 1871 by two brothers, Eugene Bretel and Adolphe Bretel. The butter was made in the Manche area of Normandy, France. The type of butter they sold was beurre d’Isigny, which refers to an origin-registered butter made from cow’s milk in areas surrounding Isigny-du-Mer.”
In Bradstreet’s Weekly: A Business Digest, Volume 19, a person who visited the Bretel factory recounted what they saw there. Butter was purchased from dairy farmers in the area before being graded and processed. The butter was shaped into a rectangular block, rolled on a slab and packaged in boxes. Often called Normandy roll butter, Bretel’s blocks of butter were once a favorite in Great Britain.
There was another type of butter that Bretel also made, notes the witness, which was packaged in tins and reserved for shipping to “hot countries.” Salt was always added to these canned butter.
Our butter arrives separated, and after mixing it back together and putting it in the fridge to set, we take a taste. It’s delicious! Saltier than regular American butter, and because its cultured, it has a rich umami flavor that makes it taste extra creamy.
My mom in law is convinced that the current Bretel butter has less salt than the formulation from her childhood. The salt was probably reduced as shipping and storage practices got better.
Xavier, who is French, helps me search the French internet for more information. According to Wikimanche, the original beurrerie closed in 1960. The trademark for Bretel is currently held by Ngo Van The, who filed it in 1964.
Searching for Bretel on Import Yeti, you can see that a full shipping container is imported every couple of months.
Maybe the shipping containers contain goods other than butter, but the address for the Import Yeti listing matches the address on the can:
With that kind of import volume, the butter must still be in active production. Ngo Van The must have seen the demand for Bretel butter in Vietnam when the original factory closed, taken over the Bretel trademark, and found another beurre d’Isigny manufacturer to package butter under the Bretel name for him to sell.
Who could the manufacturer be? Xavier bets that it’s Briois, who manufactures Francelia butter, which is packaged in cans identical to Bretel.
Xavier finds the European Community identification health mark from the back of the can. The number on the Bretel can is 62.510.102 which is Briois number.
The first number is the Department number, 62 being Pas de Calais, 62.510 being then Liévin (https://www.insee.fr/fr/information/4316069). 102 being the identification number for Briois inside Liévin.
And there we have it! Mystery solved!
Now we can also confirm the claim from Viet World Kitchen, that Beurdell butter is also made by the same manufacturer as Bretel:
The only questions remaining are: Is there any difference between the current Bretel butter, and the butter from my mom in law’s childhood, from when Ngo Van The first took over the trademark? And what of the butter from the original factory from the brothers Bretel? Did it taste the same as it does now?
Update January 12, 2024: This is my most viewed article, getting 50 views every single week for the past 2 years. Vietnamese people love Bretel!! I thought Bretel deserved its own Wikipedia article, and I made one and added my images there.
