Clarifying Butter

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Clarifying Butter
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• "Clarifying" is the process of removing milk
  solids from butterfat, giving you a clear golden
  fat that can be heated to a higher temperature
  without burning than whole butter. This, combined
  with the fact it can be stored without going
  rancid, has made clarified butter the cooking fat
  of choice in India and South Asia for hundreds of
  years.

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• 1. To make 1 cup of clarified butter you'll need
  1¼ cup of butter.                         (You
  will lose approximately 25 of the original
  butter's total volume when clarifying.)

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• 2. Place butter in a saucepan over a very low
  heat. Let the butter melt slowly, do not stir the
  butter while it is melting.

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• 3. As the butter melts, it will separate
  into three layers. The top layer is a thin layer
  of foam, the middle layer contains the bulk of
  the liquid (weighing in at about 80 of the
  total), and bottom layer is where the water and
  most of the milk solids are. This natural
  separation is what makes clarifying possible.

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• 4. Skim the foam off the surface of the butter,
  discard the foam. Be cautious to avoid dipping
  the ladle into the butterfat while skimming, as
  the fat should remain intact.

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• 5. At this point, there are two possible methods
  for removing the butterfat from the water on the
  bottom of the pan. The method we chose to
  illustrate is to decant the fat from the water.

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• 6. Carefully and slowly pour the fat into another
  container. You can see the water underneath the
  clear yellow butterfat. If you notice any of the
  water slipping into the fat, you may need to
  re-decant your new batch of clarified butter. If
  there is any water in the clarified butter, and
  you try adding it to a hot pan, the water will
  immediately boil when it hits the pan, causing
  the hot clarified butter to splatter out of the
  pan and potentially burning the cook.

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• 7. If the clarified butter sits for a moment, you
  might notice more foam float to the top use a
  spoon to remove this last bit of foam.