glorious ghee

Scroll down to see 2018 update below

Ghee is Mother Nature's healthiest cooking substance from Krsna's favorite and the best of animals- mother cow.

A SUPER QUICK STOVE TOP METHOD
Put about 4 lbs of unwrapped butter into a large pot. Bring the butter to a boil.

STAGE ONE
It foams up in this initial stage, so make sure the pot is big enough that it won't boil over kept on high heat. You might want to stir it, but with experience you'll find it isn't necessary.

STAGE TWO
The next stage, the foam will go down and the texture changes to a glossy-like, oily looking consistency.

STAGE THREE
Keep cooking and stirring if needed until the ghee and ghee solids separate. It'll start looking more clear instead of opaque. Make a test by taking a little scoop with a measuring cup and examining it. The solids will settle at the bottom of the cup.

With experience you won't need to follow this step. Simply allow it to continue to cook until a new sort of bubbles begin to arise. You'll learn over time to recognize what I mean. But be careful not to cook too long or the ghee will start to foam and continue to do so uncontrollably if used later on for deep frying! Luckily, the ghee is still usable; just not a good idea to deep fry with. Trust me. Do not deep fry with overcooked ghee.

So after the new bubbles start to arise (not foam), you can turn off the ghee at this point, leaving it on the burner and usually the solids will settle to the bottom and brown a bit while sitting to cool. This will make it easier to separate the solids from the ghee when straining it through a cloth shortly afterwards while the ghee is still hot.

FINISHED!
Strain the finished ghee through a clean thin cotton cloth and wire colander into a suitable container, such as a moderately large, stainless steel can with a lid (A smaller jar may also be used to keep near the stove and refill from the larger storage container as needed).

First pour out as much ghee as possible into the cloth to drain into the can without getting any solids in from the bottom that may interfere with the drainage. Finally, toss in all the solids and scrape the pot to get them all out. Tie the cloth and it hang above the ghee container to let the last bits of ghee drip from the solids before discarding them.

You don't have to refrigerate ghee if its been made properly, but it is a good idea beforehand, whenever traveling with ghee, to prevent spillage.

Also it may be a good idea that after once using ghee for deep frying during a cooking session, use up that ghee by way of chaunce, to fry pancakes, etc. instead of deep frying with the same ghee over and over again. That way, since the ghee is not overly deep fried in, it doesn't get nasty looking like motor oil nor taste bad and nothing gets wasted because ghee that has been deep fried in many times is not even suitable for eating and should be otherwise discarded. Before getting to that point, therefore, it can be used in better ways.

If you hate to throw out the solids, a little can be used in soups for extra nice flavoring. Also stray dogs and cats like it (Unsalted butter only). Let the solids drain real well and then refrigerate a bit first, so that they are easier to remove as a semi solid lump from the cloth. There must be other things that can be done with it, too...perhaps a bird feeder (?).

UPDATE
My latest method for removing even more milk solids than ever before:
In step three lower the heat to a simmer. When the gher is clear and solids browned at the bottom, skim off the foam on top and set aside.

Strain all into a storage container. After it drains, scoop out tensing solids and the foam set aside to strain out more ghee.

Sexual Liberation or Sexual Repression?

A pretty, young woman from the east coast told the following story:

"My propensity toward marriage and family life was present from early childhood. I got my first marriage proposal in the sand box at age five. He said he wanted to be a policeman when he grew up, and we planned to have ten children. Then when I was about eight years old,  a mock wedding was performed on my parent's front porch with my little brother acting as a priest. In my memory I wore a wedding gown that was just my size. Maybe I got it from a Halloween outfit...Otherwise, the power of imagination at that age certainly must have created one.

"In our neighborhood (the early 1960's), my friends and I roamed freely from house to house, knowing there was a mother present in every home. And although we lived in a major American city,  I safely walked alone down an alley several blocks to kindergarten each school day.

"Yet, sometime in the middle of fourth grade, my parents moved our family residence west and my world completely changed. Instead of planning on marriage, I was told to plan on college and a career. And my mother, attracted to the feminist movement and thus encouraging me in that way, was suddenly very restless and unhappy at home and started working outside.

"I felt like I'd lost my mother at nine years old. And we'd often hear about families close to us being broken up by divorce. And from the time I was 10-17, my friends ranged from runaways to rape victims to girls who were practically prostitutes by their promiscuous behavior. We felt encouraged to unrestrictedly mingle with the opposite sex during and after school  time.

"I remember my friends and I standing on a street in a tourist town looking for men... Some of us girls had abortions.

"We were told that this was freedom."

Meanwhile, understanding the sad situation of this young lady and so many like her, Srila Prabhupada had come to America, crossing the Atlantic to save us all from such an illusion. He spoke out:

"In the Bhagavad-gitä, the Supreme Personality of Godhead says that one who has spiritual vision sees everyone as equal. And yet in another place the Supreme Lord says, strisu dustäsu värsneya jäyate varna-sankarah: unless you protect women, low-class men will seduce them, and society will be burdened with unwanted children. Just take this 'women's liberation'—it is simply a trick by the men. Now the men can have free prostitutes, that's all." ( --BTG 1979)

Similarly, during a morning walk in Bombay in 1977, this conversation took place:

 Hamsadüta:  Prabhupäda, you gave the example that what is the use of keeping a cow if you can get milk in the marketplace.

Prabhupäda: Yes. Yes. Cow-keeping is expensive.

Dr. Patel: Why keep a cow when milk is available. (laughs)

Trivikrama: It's a fact. The young men think like that.

Prabhupäda: They make pregnant and they go away. And this poor girl, either she has to kill the child or beg from the government, "Give me welfare; otherwise..." Is that freedom?

Today, the author of Domestic Tranquility, Carolyn Graglia echoes Prabhupada's statement.

"How could we allow such a catastrophe to take place? The feminist revolution was powered by male greed -- for sex, money, and irresponsibility. 'The women's movement,' Mrs. Graglia writes, 'could have been orchestrated by Playboy: readily available sex without marriage; if married, a working wife to unburden the male from responsibility for supporting the household; readily available abortion to eliminate unwanted children . . .' Women are advised nowadays (by sober, good-hearted feminists) that, given the no-fault divorce laws that make it so easy to chuck an old wife and get a spiffy new one, they had better be prepared to earn their own living. 'No-fault divorce laws did not, however, result from an edict of the gods or from some force of nature, but from sustained political efforts, particularly by the feminist movement.' Statistics show that in the first year after divorce the average woman and her minor children experience a severe decline in living standards."

So, it turns out that while this young woman and her girlfriends were told that we were sexually liberated, actually they were being sexually repressed, repressed from the normal result of responsible sex life, namely bearing children and nurturing them within the spiritual asrama designed by Krishna, within the husband and wife relationship. They are living proof that feminism doesn't work for normal women. Or as one devotee put it: "Although the feminists claim to be giving more freedom to people, actually they are taking away people's freedoms, freedoms to live a sane and normal life."

Srila Prabhupada writes in Srimad Bhagavatam 4.25.42purport: "A young woman who has no husband is called anätha, meaning 'one who is not protected.' As soon as a woman attains the age of puberty, she immediately becomes very much agitated by sexual desire. It is therefore the duty of the father to get his daughter married before she attains puberty. Otherwise she will be very much mortified by not having a husband." --SB 4.25.42 p

Reading such statements in Prabhupada's books, our young friend says that finally she felt understood and that "Despite such horrible conditioning during my teenage years and the untold, lifelong heartache it has brought to me, my life's been redirected towards a happier ending.  Thanks to Srila Prabhupada and the Vaisnava acaryas, I've found my way back home,  gradually learning to dovetail my natural girlhood longings towards marriaged life for the service of Lord Chaitanya's sankirtana mission."