Degchi
Ghee
Also written: clarified butter
- Urduگھی
- Hindiघी
- Banglaঘি
- Arabicسمن
Ghee is butter that has been simmered until the water cooks off and the milk solids toast and are strained out, leaving clear golden fat. It smells nutty, a little like caramel, and it keeps at room temperature for a good while when handled cleanly.
Cooks reach for it for two reasons. It tolerates heat better than plain butter, since the milk solids that burn are already gone, and it gives food an aroma you cannot get from neutral oil. It shows up in the final tadka on daal, in paratha cooking, and in sweets such as gulab jamun. It is also one of the most common ingredients in our recipe library.
A small spoon goes a long way. For tadka, a tablespoon is usually enough for a pot of daal. For paratha, brush a little on each side as it cooks. For rice, a spoonful stirred in at the end adds richness without any frying.
Keep it in a clean, dry jar and use a dry spoon every time, because water and crumbs are what spoil it. If you are out, neutral oil works in most savoury dishes with the same method but a less fragrant result. For a tadka you can add a small knob of butter to the oil for some of the flavour, keeping the heat a little lower so the butter does not burn.
Recipes that use it
63 of our 247 recipes call for ghee. Here are a few to start with.
- Dal Tadka
- Gulab Jamun
- Nihari
- Potato-Stuffed Flatbread
- Egg-Stuffed Flatbread
- Anday ka Khagina (Spiced Scrambled Eggs)
Read next
South Asian Recipes in US Cups and Ounces: A Practical Conversion Guide