Liquid Gold

What's gold, doesn't burn, doesn't spoil, and doesn't smoke? Give up? CLARIFIED BUTTER!! DUH!! Clarified Butter aka Drawn Butter aka Ghee is butter in its purest form.

Have you ever burned butter when you were cooking eggs or breakfast?  It's so easy to burn butter and it's a pain in the butt!  What makes clarified butter clarified is that you're taking out the milk solids from the butter.  The milk solids is what burns because it's protein and of course we all know that protein burns.  In fact, after you remove the milk solids from the butter it is no longer considered dairy.

I use clarified butter for EVERYTHING...well almost everything.  You would you use it just like oil.  You can use it to saute, sear, fry, even poach!  You can also use it for dipping lobster or even making hollandaise.  But once you clarify it you wouldn't use it like butter.  That means can't spread it on butter or use it to make a beurre blanc (butter sauce).  When cooking with clarified butter it gives the flavor of butter but like I said it won't burn smoke or spoil...so easily.

Though you can buy it at the store it's so much easier to make. Let me show you how!

You want a good quality butter. Well...you always want good quality EVERYTHING.  What's a good butter?  Definitely not the ones you find at your local super market.  You might want to try places like Wegmans or Wholefoods and don't be afraid to ask around.  One thing you definitely want to ask is, "How old is the butter?"  You want fresh butter...the freshest you can get it.

Ok...so all you need is a cheese cloth (coffee filter works just fine), a jar, a pot, and of course...your montequilla (butter in spanish).

Place your butter in the pot and put over low heat.  Clarifying butter is not something that should be, can be, or will be rushed.  If the heat is too high the milk solids will burn and your clarified butter will taste burnt....not good.  So take your time please.

After about 15 minutes or so you'll see this foamy white stuff floating on the top...what is this?  You guessed it...milk solids!

At this point you can do 2 things.  You can either skim the top with a ladel removing all the milk solids OR you can take your cheese cloth, slightly wet it, put it over the jar and pour the butter into the jar.  The cheese cloth will catch the milk solids.  The reason you wet the cloth is because fat and water do not mix.  So if you poured it through a dry cloth it'll soak into the cloth and some of the milk solids will make it through.  BE CAREFUL!  THE BUTTER WILL BE HOT!...idiot

Now how do you know if you've clarified correctly?  MAKE SURE IT"S CLEAR!  I mean absolutely NOTHING in it...you should be able to see the table looking down through the butter.  It should look like...well...LIQUID GOLD.  After you've clarified your butter you must let it cool for about an hour before covering it and refrigerating.  The butter will solidify so don't worry when you take it out the next day and it's become rock solid.  All you need to do is take a spoon and scrape a little off the top and throw it into the pan.  And watch how the butter DOES NOT burn, it just melts and awaits to make your food taste delicious. 

This whole process should take you no more than 30 minutes.  So it's not a day long process.  I mean half the time is just melting the butter! 

Of course you can go out and buy clarified butter but i'll tell you why you should clarify you're own.
Land O Lakes sells a 5lb. tub of clarified butter for over $100!!  Now of course you're not gonna need 5lbs of butter but i'm just telling you to compare.  You can buy 5lbs of whole butter for about $10.  So you do the math.  Just putting that out there.  If you ask anyone that knows me I really cook everything with butter (except asian food and some spanish food).  I sear my steaks, make my sauces with it, saute my vegetables and cook my breakfast with it.  It's soooo versatile!!

Oh yeah, clarified butter will stay good for (from my experience) about 4-6 months refrigerated.  But if you don't plan on using all your butter you can freeze your clarified butter.

Now go out and start clarifying!!

bien manger
-cwis

PS - I'm sorry for my absence!  I've been pretty busy but I am happy to announce that I do have 3 other unfinished blogs and I've come across and WHOLE DUCK.  So from the whole duck about 3-4 blogs will be created.  One being Duck Confit :)