Clarified butter step by step: Easy recipe for butter clarification
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Total: 10 min Diners: 4
Butter is a mixture of fat, water and protein. The clarified butter is the same butter when we are left with only the fat because we have eliminated the water and protein. Clarifying butter is an essential process for cooking with butter because when we are left with only the fat part it withstands higher temperatures without burning.
Ingredients
Unsalted butter, 500 g
Material needed
Saucepan Very fine sieve
Step 1
To clarify butter we chop the butter into cubes and put it over medium heat (5/10) in the saucepan until it gradually melts completely.
Step 2
Without turning up the heat we continue heating until we see how a layer of foam and lumps starts to appear. At this point remove from heat.
Step 3
With a spoon remove the top layer of foam and pass what remains through a very fine strainer, even better if we have a cotton one.
Step 4
What remains is the clarified butter, the pure fat of a very yellow color. At this point we can use it for sauces or store it in a jar in the refrigerator for several months.
Uses of clarified butter
This clarified butter that we have made can be used immediately to make a hollandaise or bearnaise sauce, for example, but it will also be used for cooking or frying with butter.
When cooking with unclarified butter it tends to burn. What burns are the proteins that held the fat and water together thanks to an emulsion. That is why clarified butter is useful for cooking, since only the fat part will not burn anything.
This is why the two main uses of clarified butter are to make sauces and to cook with it. You can see how important it can be to clarify butter, otherwise we will not have that ugly aspect of butter when we cook with it, not to mention the burnt taste it leaves.
This clarified butter, also known as ghee, is widely used in Indian cooking. It is also known as manteca cocido in Galicia and is used in the preparation of typical biscuits known as bicas.
