A great way to start this New Year is to make a jar of heart healthy ghee. It’s not difficult to make, it takes a teeny bit of your time and a wee bit of patience. The hardest part is not to walk away from the saucepan towards the end of the cooking time. Your patience will be rewarded with delicious wafts of warm butter swirling around your kitchen and the end product of a gleaming jar of pure ghee. Now, isn’t that a great way to start the year….
Both my grandmothers would say that ghee makes us stronger and I’m sure it does, as long as we don’t overdo it.
When I was younger and in Harare, I loved to be around the home of the bride-to-be during weddings, only to watch the food preparations, forget the bride, tch tch. The ghee was made a few weeks before the wedding and since ghee is the base to most things eaten at weddings, we made A LOT. We made about 50 pounds of butter at a time. A small wood fire would be made in the garden, and a gigantic pot, called a degh, was balanced onto a tripod of building bricks over the fire. In we’d toss the slabs of butter and the magic was left to unfold. Oh, I can’t possible describe the sheer bliss I felt just breathing in the wafting aromas of the ghee. Pure heaven, I’d say!!! My mouth is watering just thinking about it. Who new that years later I would have been doing the same thing, making 50lbs of butter in giant pots in a commercial kitchen in the USA!
Alas, my days of making ghee to sell commercially are over but I’d love to share with you how to make ghee at home. It really is so easy and the warm cozy feeling you get after making ghee can’t be beat!
Make Ghee at Home
Ingredients
2 lbs sweet cream organic butter or grass-fed butter (preferably high fat content).
To Make
- Place a sieve onto a clean and dry glass jar.
- Line the sieve with a coffee filter and keep near.
- Place the butter into a saucepan over a moderate heat.
- Stir occasionally until the butter has melted.
- Reduce the heat and bring the butter to a gentle boil.
- A slight foam will form, which is okay and it will prevent you from seeing the liquid below. Gently push it away with a spoon or skim it off if you’d like.
- You will know the ghee is ready when the liquid changes from a very opaque buttery yellow to a golden orange clear liquid. During this process the milk solids will sink to the bottom of the pan.
- Once the liquid reaches a golden amber and there is very little froth on the surface of the ghee (which will happen quickly).
- Immediately remove from the heat.
- Gently and carefully pour the beautiful amber liquid into the prepared glass jar.
- Leave to cool.
- Store in a cool dark cupboard.
- It will keep for months at room temperature.
Here’s a couple of photos that may explain a little better of what to expect when making ghee…
Melting butter in saucepan.
You will know the ghee is ready when the liquid changes from a very opaque buttery yellow (above picture) to a golden orange clear liquid (below picture).
Once the liquid reaches a golden amber and there is very little froth on the surface of the ghee, which will happen quickly (above picture). Immediately remove from the heat.
During this process the milk solids will sink to the bottom of the pan (below picture)
Gently and carefully pour the beautiful amber fat through a sieve, lined with a coffee filter or brown paper towel, into a clean and dry glass jar.
Leave to cool.
Store in a cool dark cupboard.
It will keep for months at room temperature.
- Tips and Childhood memories
I personally like to use salted butter as I feel it imparts a distinct flavor.
In summer the Ghee will not completely solidify due to obvious reasons. Whereas in winter it will.
For the Love of Ghee,
XOXO
Shamim
For The Love Of Ghee 