How To Make Ghee

'Ghee' is a type of clarified butter with a high smoke point. It has been used for centuries in Indian cooking. Ghee has a nutty aroma and a nutty flavor. It is popularly used to make dals, halwa, topped on rice and khichdi, and also used for frying instead of oil.

When ghee is made in a traditional way by first fermenting the cream or malai, churning butter from it, and then cooking the butter to make ghee is cultured ghee.

This is an easy homemade ghee recipe made from scratch.

Ingredients

In order to make traditional ghee at home, you will need milk cream (malai) and yogurt culture. Malai is obtained by boiling raw milk or pasteurized non-homogenized whole milk. You can also use heavy cream instead of collecting milk cream.

A layer of cream is formed once the milk cools down after boiling. The collected cream can be refrigerated or stored in the freezer in a container until you have enough (2-3 cups). It is best to use the cream within a week's time if you are refrigerating else freezing it is a better choice to store it longer.

There is a layer of cream on the top of non-homogenized milk (known as cream on top or cream top or cream line milk) which can be scooped from the bottle/container before pouring out the milk from it.

If you don't want to make cultured ghee but just make ghee from cream butter, you can use organic unsalted grass-fed butter from grocery stores.

Instructions

Cultured ghee is made by collecting the cream from raw milk or pasteurized non-homogenized whole milk after boiling. The collected milk cream, known as 'malai' is fermented in an Instant Pot using yogurt culture.

Cultured butter is extracted from this fermented cream by churning it in a blender. The butter is then simmered to separate the milk solids and the clear golden liquid, cultured butter ghee.

Once you have collected enough malai from the top of the boiled raw milk or non-homogenized milk, transfer the collected cream into an Instant Pot container and add some yogurt culture to it.

If you are using heavy cream, warm the cream before adding culture to it.

Close the lid and turn the Instant Pot on "Yogt" mode on normal setting for 10 hours. Refrigerate the fermented cream for a few hours before making butter.

Make cultured butter

Blend the fermented cream using Vitamix, a food processor, or any other blender on high speed. Add some cold water and ice cubes as needed while blending.

Butter will separate out and the by-product is homemade buttermilk. Filter out the butter using a strainer and squeeze out as much liquid from the butter as possible.

Now you have homemade cultured butter for making cultured or traditional ghee.

Make cultured ghee

Put the extracted cultured butter in the Instant Pot container on sauté mode and 'low' setting. You can also use stovetop but the same Instant Pot container used for fermentation can be used.

The butter will melt and have a layer of foam on the top. Continue simmering for about 15-18 minutes and monitor it every 5-7 minutes.

The milk solids will separate and start settling at the bottom and clear golden liquid will form on the top.

In the final stages, bubbles will form and the milk solids will start turning brownish. The ghee is ready, press the 'cancel' button and remove the container from the Instant Pot else the ghee can get overcooked and turn brown.

The ghee will be hot, carefully strain it in glass containers or mason jars using a fine strainer, cheesecloth, or a nut milk bag. Do not pour hot ghee into a plastic container.

Variations

The simplest way to make ghee is by using store-bought unsalted butter. If you are using cream, you can skip the fermentation process and directly blend the cream in the blender to make butter.

Simmer the butter in the same way on medium-low heat until milk solids turn light brown and settle down at the bottom of the pan. Also, bubbles will start forming on the clear golden liquid on top.

Filter the ghee into a glass jar using a nut milk bag or a fine strainer and store it at room temperature.

Serving suggestions

Ghee is commonly used in Indian cooking to make dals, rice dishes, desserts and applied on top of roti or paratha (flatbread). Ghee is one of the main ingredients in making dal bafla, a popular traditional Indian dish

It can easily substitute oil in most of the recipes. Check out this awesome collection of the recipes made with ghee.

Storage

Ghee can be stored at room temperature in plastic, glass, or stainless steel containers. It has a very good shelf life and can be stored for a year or beyond. It is shelf-stable and it is not required to refrigerate it. It can be stored at room temperature.

Recipes using ghee

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