Literally any vegetable is good with salt pepper and butter :)

Add some bacon to really juice the effect.

Then remove the broccoli

Yes, once you've eliminated the taste of the vegetable you can start experimenting with lots of things that taste good!

Another variation, which my family really enjoys is: cut fresh broccoli into small florets; toss with olive oil and (optionally) salt/pepper; roast in oven at high temp until desired softness.

I tried butter with my broccoli once, and I found it tasted unpleasantly fatty. (And I'm no stranger to fatty foods.)

Well, what about black licorice with salt and butter?

Anethole, one of the major flavour components of liquorice, is shared among a range of popular cooking herbs and spices.

Milder-tasting fennel goes great with loads of cooking, it's quite common to chop up a fennel root to add to slow-cook roasts / braises, or sprinkle fennel seeds over roasts and mix into dry rubs.

Anise has a stronger flavour than fennel, which lends itself to stocks, sauces and curries.

Less commonly you'll see liquorice root itself used in cooking, I haven't used it myself but I don't see why it wouldn't work - if balanced out and seasoned properly.

edit: Of course, just pan frying a slab of black liquorice with salt and butter would get mixed reactions, personally I'd find it overpowering, like eating straight up peppercorns even though they work well in moderation as a seasoning.

I find tarragon to be reminiscent of anise as well.

I don’t really buy that it makes that much of a difference. As a child I hated all forms of broccoli, could barely stomach it. Now that I’ve grown older I find even the plain steamed stuff edible. While I certainly like it prepped like you described, it still in the end has the taste of broccoli in it. I have a hard time imagining someone who hates the vegetable caring about how it was prepared.

It probably makes more of a difference if you kind-of liked it to start with. I will happily munch on broccoli and other green veg out of choice, but it can taste a bit plain. If you salt and butter it, it brings out the flavour, which is a good thing if you like the underlying taste.

A little acid (lemon juice) goes a long way too.

I never got the broccoli hate. I had no problems with it as a kid. I wonder if it's another genetic thing like cilantro