If you’re trying to eat real, ghee is a great cooking oil – and its simple to make. All you need is butter! Here’s how to make homemade ghee!
If you’re like most Americans, you might not have heard of ghee before – it’s still not widely known or used in the states – but ghee is a traditional food that’s been around for thousands of years. It can be used in place of bad-for-you vegetable oils in almost any recipe. It’s a common ingredient in Indian cuisine; and it makes food taste absolutely delicious – but what is it?
Basically, ghee is butter oil. It’s a very stable, real food cooking oil – and since it’s made of butter, it doesn’t have a strong flavor that could overpower to taste of your food (like coconut oil or olive oil can in some mild-tasting recipes). Any food that you would use cooking oil to create can use ghee.
If you know much about Indian cuisine, you know that Indian cooks take food very, very seriously. They’re patient with it. They pour love in it. It’s considered a point of pride for every family to have its own unique curry (curry isn’t a spice – it’s a spice blend, and although it generally contains the same spices, such as cumin and tumeric, the proportions are unique to each family) – and for many Indian home cooks, it’s also a point of pride to make delicious food from scratch on mere pennies.
Although ghee might not always be available in stores, it’s easy enough to buy online – but it’s so, so much cheaper to make yourself (I bought butter for $3.69, and priced ghee at an online store at $6-something – so I saved almost 50%!) It’s also easy and quick (about 10 minutes). If you take your food even half as seriously as an Indian cook, then you owe it to yourself to give this recipe a try!
How to Make Homemade Ghee:
- 1 lb unsalted butter
Place the entire pound of butter in a skillet over medium-high heat and allow it to melt.
Once it’s all melted, it’ll form a foam on top, like this:
This first foam will disappear. Once your butter is boiling (2-3 minutes) reduce heat to medium and wait for a second, thicker foam to appear. This is the milk solids. Cook it until it turns golden brown.
Using a cheesecloth or a fine mesh strainer (to strain out the milk solids) pour the ghee into a storage container. I used a mason jar (since it wouldn’t melt, and I prefer glass for storage anyway). Just in case of splashing, since it’s super hot, I used my canning funnel.
Then it’s done! Store in the refrigerator (it will solidify), and use it as you would use any cooking oil!
As I said before, you can use this for anything – but since we’re talking Indian cuisine (I’m craving it, anyway), how about this chicken tikka masala for dinner, and this spicy rice to go with it?
YUM!!!!
Jaime is a Christian, a wife, a mom, a writer, an illustrator, and an aspiring homesteader. She loves trying to find new ways to save money and resources--but also save her time, so she can spend as much as possible with her family! !
I’m definitely going to make some! Thanks!
Wow – I have never heard of that before. Sounds awesome.
That’s so neat. It looks fairly easy to make. Thanks for sharing!!
when you go to use it, do you warm it up to become a liquid again and then measure it?
I don’t – but I usually just stab some out with a fork and slap it in the pan. I don’t “measure” when I’m cooking, lol! It gets pretty firm, so it would be *easier* to scoop out if it were liquid, but it’s not necessary.
I have never heard of this either. I do use butter for cooking though. Is there a reason this is any better than just using butter?
It depends on what you’re going for – this removes the milk solids, which *can* be a problem if you’re cooking on high heat (they can start smoking). Basically, it raises the smoking point and makes a more stable cooking oil.
Seems easy enough!! I’ve actually never heard of ghee before, but sounds like a great substitute.
Very interesting. Thanks for sharing.
I had never heard of this before! Very cool!
Wow! That is easy. I use ghee all of the time…and some places locally charge between $8-$11 per jar! Thanks for the recipe