Melting butter

[Fire Me Boy!]

Anyone here want to chat about melting butter?

I gotta be honest - I use the microwave almost entirely when I need to melt butter, unless I'm doing it just to cook with it on the stove. But sometimes, baked goods or breads require melted butter, so that goes in the microwave.

But I hate when some of the water in the butter explodes, and sends half your butter all over the inside of the science oven. That stuff's hard to clean up.

But if I'm cooking with it, obviously it just goes straight in the pan or pot.

Now, there is one instance where I melt a butt load of butter all at once - when I'm making ghee. I'll put like 2 pounds in the dutch oven and melt that, but then I keep on cooking it until the milk solids separate and start to brown and all the water in the oil boils out. By the way, I wouldn't really recommend cultured butter for this, as you mostly lose all the complexities of the nice butter. I've had equally good experiences with $7/pound butter as the cheaper stuff.

[Fire Me Boy!]

Originally Posted by Stewie

This is true, but my Indian colleague makes it this way. To make "real" ghee things go far beyond caramelizing milk solids. They don't bother, so why should I?

Well, clarified butter is super tasty by itself, not knocking it by any means.

Not sure what you mean by "way beyond," because I've never read anything close to that for plain ghee (without any spices). It's not as far as brown butter. It does take more time because you want all of the water gone, which doesn't happen with clarified.

But as to your question... Why? Because it's super easy and tastes better!

[BucEyedPea]

Originally Posted by Fried Meat Ball!

Anyone here want to chat about melting butter?

I gotta be honest - I use the microwave almost entirely when I need to melt butter, unless I'm doing it just to cook with it on the stove. But sometimes, baked goods or breads require melted butter, so that goes in the microwave.

But I hate when some of the water in the butter explodes, and sends half your butter all over the inside of the science oven. That stuff's hard to clean up.

But if I'm cooking with it, obviously it just goes straight in the pan or pot.

Now, there is one instance where I melt a butt load of butter all at once - when I'm making ghee. I'll put like 2 pounds in the dutch oven and melt that, but then I keep on cooking it until the milk solids separate and start to brown and all the water in the oil boils out. By the way, I wouldn't really recommend cultured butter for this, as you mostly lose all the complexities of the nice butter. I've had equally good experiences with $7/pound butter as the cheaper stuff.

Why would you ruin one of your quality ingredients by using a microwave to melt it? It affects the flavor.

I use my itty-bitty melting pan when I want to melt butter. There's a gadget for everything.

[GloryDayz]

I always have two sticks on the counter (covered) so there's soft better ready to go. When one stick is done, the next comes out.

As for melting, I do nuke it, but I do it on "2" and I do it in 5-10 second increments (fork-stirring along the way).

[Stewie]

Originally Posted by Fried Meat Ball!

Well, clarified butter is super tasty by itself, not knocking it by any means.

Not sure what you mean by "way beyond," because I've never read anything close to that for plain ghee (without any spices). It's not as far as brown butter. It does take more time because you want all of the water gone, which doesn't happen with clarified.

But as to your question... Why? Because it's super easy and tastes better!

True ghee has additional cultures, similar to yogurt. I don't know the details, but it sounds like a pain in the ass. So, there's ghee1, ghee2 and ghee3. Ghee3 is authentic, the others are simple variations.

[Just Passin' By]

Originally Posted by Stewie

True ghee has additional cultures, similar to yogurt. I don't know the details, but it sounds like a pain in the ass. So, there's ghee1, ghee2 and ghee3. Ghee3 is authentic, the others are simple variations.

I think you're talking about "true ghee" being made from the very start, which is raw milk that is boiled, cooled, and then treated with curd cultures. Once you've got butter, you're doing things the same.

[Fire Me Boy!]

Originally Posted by Stewie

True ghee has additional cultures, similar to yogurt. I don't know the details, but it sounds like a pain in the ass. So, there's ghee1, ghee2 and ghee3. Ghee3 is authentic, the others are simple variations.

I'm not trying to be argumentative here, really, Stewie. I like you, and your knowledge in food is well documented here.

But I'm specifically trying to find anything online that tells me about additional cultures used for ghee, even trying to find "authentic" Indian ghee recipes, and I'm finding nothing except something that is basically what I've been making. I even searched "ghee3" to no avail.

Unless this authentic ghee isn't pure oil - which as I understand it is a requirement of ghee - there's no way any cultures would grow in it.

The closest thing I could find to what you're talking about this: http://www.indiacurry.com/dairy/d005ghee.htm, which has you make a cultured butter before making the ghee. But the process of making the ghee is exactly the same, which means you could do it with pretty much any kind of butter as long as you didn't care about being 100 percent authentic. And if you did, you could buy cultured (European) butter. I've done that, by the way, and couldn't tell much of a difference, if any.

So perhaps you're friend is adding in the cultured butter step, which would make sense with what you're saying, and I totally agree would be an awful lot of work for ghee.

[Fire Me Boy!]

Originally Posted by Just Passin' By

I think you're talking about "true ghee" being made from the very start, which is raw milk that is boiled, cooled, and then treated with curd cultures. Once you've got butter, you're doing things the same.

Beat me to the punch. I agree.

[BucEyedPea]

I bought my first ghee in a jar at the organic food market. Now, that's what I call easy! Easiest ghee ev'ah!

[Fire Me Boy!]

Originally Posted by BucEyedPea

I bought my first ghee in a jar at the organic food market. Now, that's what I call easy! Easiest ghee ev'ah!

Just out of curiosity, how much money for how much ghee?

[BucEyedPea]

Originally Posted by Fried Meat Ball!

Just out of curiosity, how much money for how much ghee?

I can't remember. It was three weeks ago—maybe. I may still have the receipt but I got a lot of travel stuff splayed all around right now.

[BucEyedPea]

FMB, I just checked the label thinkin' it may have a price on it but no. IIRC it was about $5.99 - $7-8'ish (no more than that) for 7.5 ozs.

But whaddya know, the label says "Organic GHEE" with the words "Clarified Butter" right under that.

Thought I'd add more confusion to the debate with that.

[Fire Me Boy!]

Originally Posted by BucEyedPea

FMB, I just checked the label thinkin' it may have a price on it but no. IIRC it was about $5.99 - $7-8'ish (no more than that) for 7.5 ozs.



But whaddya know, the label says "Organic GHEE" with the words "Clarified Butter" right under that.



Thought I'd add more confusion to the debate with that.

No confusion. Ghee is a type of clarified butter. I mentioned that in post 43.

[Fire Me Boy!]

Regarding your buy, making it at home you can more than double your value.

[BucEyedPea]

Originally Posted by Fried Meat Ball!

Regarding your buy, making it at home you can more than double your value.

Yeah, but time is money and that was made with organic butter. Ingredients on the side say: "Certified Organic Butter."

Organic butter costs an arm-and-a-leg or thereabouts.

[BucEyedPea]

To be honest with you, making ghee is one thing that I find too challenging. I made it once in college and it was a disaster. Can't bear to waste good butter now.