Ghee, Glorious, Ghee (How to Make Purified Butter)

Ghee, it's all the rage in the health food world today so it was high time for me to check it out. It's been used in Indian culture and cuisine for thousands of years so I guess we are behind the eight-ball, but now that it has caught on, it's spreading like wildfire.

Basically, the process of making Ghee is just a few steps further of rendering and straining butter. When you make ghee, you remove the milk solids from butter, so you end up with a butter-like substance that lacks both lactose and is then considered "purified". Also during the purifying stage, most of the water is removed which gives the ghee a much longer shelf life. (can be stored un-fridgerated, for up to a year).

Ghee provides essential fatty acids (where are necessary for our body) and is considered the most digestible fat (some even say it aids the digestion process!). It can be heated to high temperatures which makes it great for cookin

g and it also contains vitamin A and E.

That being said it is a pure saturated fat, so, like all fats, should be used sparingly.

The clarifying process is easy! Start with a pound of unsalted butter (four sticks), the better the quality of butter the better the quality of ghee. Put them in a pan on medium heat and DON'T stir them. The process will take about 20-25 minutes. You will start to see a froth rise to the top of the pan and a sediment will start to fall to the bottom of the pan. The butter will start to bubble and hiss gently and the sediment will slowly turn a golden brown.

At about the 20 minute mark the bubbling and hissing will quiet down and the sediment will be a

amber color. If you can't see the sediment, gently, tip the pan to get a look at it. When the sediment is

an amber color turn the heat off immediately so it won't burn. Let it sit for about five minutes.

Line a strainer with cheesecloth and pour the liquid through into a sterile jar. I actually forgot the cheesecloth and in a state of emergency while the butter was on the burner, I ripped my house apart for a cheesecloth like material, ended up with a sheet of gauze from the med kit hah. You can see all the milk solids that were left over. I tasted them, they kind of tasted like parmesan cheese in a way…
While the Ghee was still warm, it looked like this below
But after it had cooled to room temperature it sort of had a whipped butter texture (the first picture on the page). I'm not really sure how I feel about the way my ghee came out. It tastes fine but almost has a grainy texture. I figure it'll be good for cooking. I think maybe my use of gauze as opposed to cheesecloth might have had something to do with it. I'll update ya'll next time I make it with the proper equipment and see if it makes a difference in the texture.

Well that's all for now folks! Now get making some Ghee!