Ghee Whizz! Making gold from butter.
Pure Golden Ghee - a collaboration between Gippsland chef Shalem Raj and friend, Sallie Jones from Gippsland Jersey.
Gippsland chef Shalem Raj makes good ghee. It is so good, fellow Indian expats have been driving hours to the country town of Drouin just to get some of his clarified butter. The Bangalore-born, short-order chef owns a takeaway in the back streets of this old dairy town in West Gippsland, serving homemade pies to passing tradies. Two years ago, he started experimenting, making small batches of ghee in a 20-litre brass pot. Ghee is a deep yellow butterfat that is an essential part of many Indian cuisines. Word got out and Indian cooks and chefs from around Victoria started heading to Raj’s Kitchen to get their hands on his ghee. “To have the support of my countrymen was very encouraging,” says Mr Raj.
In September 2021, Raj teamed up with an old friend, co-owner of Gippsland Jersey dairy company, Sallie Jones. A decade earlier the two met when Raj was a student, staying at Jones’ father in law’s student boarding house in Melbourne. “I met this beautiful young man who was so eager to work in hospitality, yet no one would take him on,” says Ms Jones “I set him up with chef John Snelling at a restaurant called The Outpost Retreat in Noojee.” Snelling was previously Head Chef at Di Stasio in St Kilda. When Snelling sold the business seven later, Raj moved from fine dining to fast food when he bought the Drouin takeaway. When Sallie Jones found out that Raj was toying with ghee, she saw an opportunity. “Our company makes butter,” she says. “We know how to deliver dairy around the state. Raj cooks exceptional food. Ghee is becoming popular. It was pretty simple.”
In September Jones started supplying Raj with freshly made cultured butter from her factory in East Gippsland. “In India, ghee is made with cultured butter,” says Mr. Raj. “It brings much flavour to the food it is cooked with.” Raj invested in a 300-litre hand-beaten copper pot imported from India. Now, one day a week, he turns off the pie oven and turns on the gas stove and loads up the 300-litre tambe ka gamla, as it’s known in India, with Gippsland Jersey cultured butter. “It takes me six hours to turn the butter into ghee,” says Mr Raj. “I have to constantly stir the pot to remove the solids that include protein and lactose, as the water in the butter slowly evaporates.” At the end of a long day, he pours the liquid ghee into jars, and allows the ghee to cool and solidify. The resulting ghee is rich and smooth with a nutty slightly mushroomy aroma and notes of caramel. Raj uses the leftover milk solids to make the filling for his butter chicken pies. “We call it kova,” says Raj. “And it is even more valuable than the ghee itself!” Raj also uses his ghee to cook his range of Indian dishes he serves at his weekly Friday Curry Night.
Gippsland Jersey Golden Ghee is available in food stores around Melbourne and Victoria and online at gippslandjersey.com.au
Sallie Jones, Gippsland Jersey with Shalem Raj
How to use ghee
Ghee is pure butterfat without the protein and lactose that is in butter. Chef Shalem Raj says that is an essential ingredient when making butter chicken, an Anglified modern classic. In India, cumin and mustard seeds, along with curry leaves, are added to hot ghee, briefly cooked to make dhal thake which is poured over dahl prior to serving. A tablespoon of ghee added to a pot of steamed rice will enrich its flavour and texture. Use ghee to cook spices and pastes in Indian dishes but use in the kitchen as one would oil to cook stir-fries and start braises. Roll par-cooked potatoes in melted ghee before roasting, use it to fry croutons or mix in mashed garlic to make garlic butter to spread over steaks.