What is the bilona method?

The word "bilona" appears on a great many ghee labels now, and it does not always mean the same thing. Here is what the method actually is, what it produces, and how it differs from the ghee most brands sell.

What is the bilona method?

Bilona is the traditional Indian way of making ghee from curd rather than from cream. Whole milk is set into curd, the curd is churned by hand with a wooden bilona until butter separates, and that butter is then simmered slowly into ghee. The bilona is the wooden churn itself, and it gives the method its name.

The distinction that matters is curd versus cream. Almost all commercial ghee is made by separating cream from milk mechanically and melting it down. Bilona ghee starts a step earlier, with whole milk cultured into dahi first.

How is bilona ghee made, step by step?

Four stages, none of them quick:

1. Setting the curd. Whole milk — not skimmed, not separated — is cultured overnight into dahi.
2. Churning. The curd is churned by hand with a wooden bilona, pulled in both directions, until makkhan rises and separates from the buttermilk.
3. Simmering. That butter is simmered over a low wood-fired flame in a brass or clay vessel until the water cooks off and the milk solids turn golden.
4. Settling. The ghee is strained and left to grain as it cools.

The low flame is the part that cannot be hurried. High industrial heat drives off the aroma, flattens the colour, and stops the grain forming at all.

How is bilona ghee different from ordinary ghee?

In three ways you can see and smell. Bilona ghee grains as it cools rather than setting smooth. It carries a pronounced nutty, cooked aroma that survives from the simmering stage. And it is deep gold rather than pale, because beta-carotene from grass-fed milk carries straight through into the jar.

Cream-separated ghee is not a bad product, and we will not pretend it is. It is efficient, consistent and much cheaper to make. But mechanical separation, standardised heating and a faster process give a milder aroma and a smoother set. A2 Gir cow ghee compared with regular ghee puts the two side by side.

Why does bilona ghee take 25 to 28 litres of milk?

Because yield is set by the fat in the milk, and the curd route is a longer path to it. It takes 25 to 28 litres of A2 Gir cow milk to make one litre of ghee. Buffalo milk carries far more fat and needs roughly half as much, which is exactly why buffalo ghee is cheaper — and why it is chalky white, since buffalo milk fat carries no carotene.

That ratio is the honest explanation for what a jar costs. Nothing else in the process comes close to it as a line item.

What does danedar mean?

Grainy. Danedar describes ghee that sets with visible granules rather than as a smooth paste, and it is the texture traditionally taken as the mark of a properly made bilona ghee. The grain comes and goes with the weather — ghee firms and grains in winter, loosens and clears in summer. Both are normal, and neither is a fault in the jar.

What is the smoke point of ghee?

250°C. That puts ghee among the most heat-tolerant fats in an Indian kitchen, level with mustard oil and well clear of the 175°C to 190°C that deep frying actually runs at. It is why ghee has always been the fat for pooris, halwa and festive frying. Smoke points of Indian cooking oils has the full comparison.

How should you store bilona ghee?

At room temperature, with a dry spoon, cap closed. It does not need refrigeration and keeps about twelve months. The only thing that will spoil it is water — a wet spoon introduces droplets that give mould somewhere to start, and that is the one mistake worth being strict about.

Is bilona ghee worth the price?

If you use ghee for flavour, yes — the aroma is the whole difference, and you notice it on a phulka or over dal within one spoon. If you use ghee purely as a cooking fat at high heat, an ordinary ghee will do that job for less money, and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise.

Ours is Gir Cow A2 ghee, hand-churned from cultured curd, made in a gaushala in the Gir region of Gujarat from the milk of free-grazing cows. Deep gold, danedar, and simmered over a wood-fired flame the way it has always been done.