Forget its 1990s bad rep - we aren't talking about the trans fat-laden fake stuff made from hydrogenated vegetable oil. True rendered ghee has been venerated through the ages in Ayurvedic medicine as the healing and nourishing essence of life-giving milk, prescribed for wound healing, digestion and longevity.
"In ayurvedic terms, ghee is a 'sweet food," wrote KT Achaya in A Historical Dictionary of Indian Food. "It is strengthening, aids digestion [and] acts quite powerfully on the mind, improving the memory and intellect."
Never mind if you're an unbeliever. For cooks, ghee has plenty of other qualities that makes it one of the better types of fat for the kitchen. Use it to sautee or deep-fry without worrying about toxic compounds - its smoke point is a sky-scraping 250 °C and it keeps for up to a month unrefrigerated.
"In ayurvedic terms, ghee is a 'sweet food," wrote KT Achaya in A Historical Dictionary of Indian Food. "It is strengthening, aids digestion [and] acts quite powerfully on the mind, improving the memory and intellect."
Never mind if you're an unbeliever. For cooks, ghee has plenty of other qualities that makes it one of the better types of fat for the kitchen. Use it to sautee or deep-fry without worrying about toxic compounds - its smoke point is a sky-scraping 250 °C and it keeps for up to a month unrefrigerated.
What gives ghee its divine flavour is its longer cooking time and partially caramelised milk solids. The process elicits a nuttier flavour than “plain jane” clarified butter, but subtler than beurre noisette. This is what makes local snacks from roti prata to sugee cookies so addictive.
The traditional method of making ghee entirely from scratch entails first culturing raw milk by spooning live curd into it and leaving it to curdle. This curd must then be churned and the butter skimmed off and simmered over a gentle heat to render out the butterfat.
You can conveniently replicate the traditional method in your home kitchen. Butter can’t be churned from conventional store-bought milk because it’s been homogenised, breaking the fat down to tiny globules that would take forever to come together. Unless you have easy access to raw milk, opt for heavy cream instead. Mix a little yoghurt into the cream and leave it to curdle overnight before churning it (if you don’t care for cultured butter, simply dive straight into simmering store-bought unsalted butter).
You can conveniently replicate the traditional method in your home kitchen. Butter can’t be churned from conventional store-bought milk because it’s been homogenised, breaking the fat down to tiny globules that would take forever to come together. Unless you have easy access to raw milk, opt for heavy cream instead. Mix a little yoghurt into the cream and leave it to curdle overnight before churning it (if you don’t care for cultured butter, simply dive straight into simmering store-bought unsalted butter).
Recipe: Ghee
- 1 litre heavy cream
- 80ml Yoghurt
Steps (Pictorial steps below):
- Thoroughly mix the yoghurt into the cream and leave it to thicken for 12 hours
- Blend the curdled cream with a handheld mixer or blender until the butter separates
- Pour off the buttermilk (use it in muffins or pancakes)
- Pour iced water over the butter and press out the remaining buttermilk
- Gently simmer the butter until the milk solids separate and sink to the bottom of the pan (the ghee is ready when the bubbling stops)
- Strain the milk solids out of the ghee
Step 1: Thoroughly mix the yoghurt into the cream and leave it to thicken for 12 hours
Step 2: Blend the curdled cream with a handheld mixer or blender until the butter separates
Step 3: Pour off the buttermilk (use it in muffins or pancakes)
Step 4: Gently simmer the butter until the milk solids separate and sink to the bottom of the pan
Step 5: Strain the milk solids out of the ghee
