How do I make clarified butter or ghee?

Butter burns at a low temperature because of its milk solids and water, not its fat. Removing both gives a fat with a smoke point around 250°C that still tastes of butter — and it keeps for months.

Safety

Step by step

1. Start with unsalted butter.Salt concentrates as the water goes and makes the result harsh. At least 250g is worth doing — smaller quantities are fiddly.
2. Melt it slowly over a low heat.Do not stir. You want the layers to separate: foam on top, clear fat in the middle, milky solids at the bottom.
3. Skim the foam.White foam rises as the water evaporates. Skim it off with a spoon and discard it.
4. Watch for the crackling to stop.The noise is water boiling off. When it goes quiet, the water has gone and only fat and solids remain.
5. Stop here for clarified butter.The solids are still pale. Pour or ladle the clear golden fat off, leaving the solids in the pan, or strain through muslin.
6. Keep going for ghee.Let the solids at the bottom turn golden brown and smell nutty — another five to ten minutes on a low heat. Then strain. Ghee is nuttier, keeps longer and is the standard cooking fat across South Asia.
7. Strain through muslin.Or a coffee filter. Any milk solids left behind shorten its keeping time and reintroduce the burning problem.
8. Store it sealed.Clarified butter keeps three months in the fridge; ghee keeps six months or more and is stable at room temperature in a sealed jar because the water is gone.
9. Use it where butter burns.Frying, searing, sautéing at temperatures where ordinary butter would blacken. It is also what goes into hollandaise and béarnaise.
10. Do not use it for baking.Cakes and pastry rely on butter's water content for steam and structure. Clarified butter changes the texture significantly.

Tips

• Low heat and patience. Rushing browns the solids before the water has gone.
• Ghee is stable at room temperature, which is why it is a store cupboard staple in hot climates.
• Never bake with it — the missing water changes the structure.

Common mistakes

• Stirring while it melts — The whole point is letting the three layers separate. Stirring keeps the milk solids suspended in the fat, so you cannot pour off a clear butter and the result burns just like ordinary butter.
• Not straining out all the solids — Milk solids are what makes butter burn and what makes it go off. Any left behind cut the smoke point and the shelf life, which are the two reasons for doing this at all.

If it doesn't work

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