A kilogram of butter gives at most about 800 g of ghee if it is table butter and about 760 g if it is white (cooking) butter, because FSSAI sets those butters' minimum milk fat at 80 and 76 per cent, and ghee is at least 99.5 per cent fat. Real batches land a little lower, because some fat stays in the brown residue.
At a glance
- The ceiling is the butter's fat: 1 kg of table butter at FSSAI's 80 per cent minimum holds 800 g of fat, white butter at 76 per cent holds 760 g, and ghee is at least 99.5 per cent fat.
- Real batches come in lower because the brown residue holds fat: 52 to 68 per cent fat in a 2023 laboratory study.
- NDDB's figure for fat lost in residue and handling when ghee is made from cream is 4 to 6 per cent, a cautious guide for butter.
- Curd-churned makkhan has about the same fat as creamery butter (78.5 to 81.3 per cent in a survey), so a kilogram yields similarly; the bilona route's big loss is earlier, in the buttermilk.
- Published recovery figures of 75 to 92 per cent describe whole methods from milk or cream, not a kilogram of butter.
How much ghee does 1 kg of butter make?
Roughly the weight of the fat in it. Ghee is almost pure milk fat, so making ghee from butter means boiling off the water and removing the solids. One kilogram of table butter at the legal minimum of 80 per cent fat holds 800 g of fat, so it can give at most about 800 g of ghee.
The sum is simple: grams of butter × fat fraction = grams of fat, and that is your ceiling for ghee. For 1 kg of table butter, 1,000 × 0.80 = 800 g. For white butter, 1,000 × 0.76 = 760 g. Strictly, FSSAI lets ghee hold up to 0.5 per cent of something other than fat, so the true ceiling is the fat divided by 0.995: 800 ÷ 0.995 = 804 g. That adds about 4 g, which we round away. These are legal minimums, so butter with more fat gives more; the fat per 100 g on the pack is your best guide.
What do the FSSAI standards say about butter and ghee?
FSSAI recognises two butters. Table butter must be made from pasteurised cream and contain at least 80 per cent milk fat, at most 16 per cent moisture, 2 per cent milk solids-not-fat and 3 per cent salt. White or cooking butter must contain at least 76 per cent milk fat. Ghee must be at least 99.5 per cent milk fat.
The ghee standard describes milk fat products as made "by means of processes which result in almost total removal of water and milk solids-not-fat", with ghee allowed at most 0.5 per cent moisture. Butter sold without saying which type it is must meet the table butter standard.
| Butter type | Minimum milk fat | Fat in 1 kg | Most ghee per kg | If 4 to 6 per cent of the fat is lost |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Table butter (FSSAI) | 80 per cent | 1,000 × 0.80 = 800 g | About 800 g | 800 × 0.94 = 752 g to 800 × 0.96 = 768 g |
| White or cooking butter (FSSAI) | 76 per cent | 1,000 × 0.76 = 760 g | About 760 g | 760 × 0.94 = 714 g to 760 × 0.96 = 730 g |
| Makkhan, curd-churned (survey average, not an FSSAI category) | 78.5 to 81.3 per cent | 785 to 813 g | About 785 to 813 g | 785 × 0.94 = 738 g to 813 × 0.96 = 780 g |
The 4 to 6 per cent loss column borrows a figure the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) gives for butterfat lost in the ghee residue and in handling when ghee is made straight from cream. Cream carries more solids than butter, so treat that column as a cautious guide rather than a measurement for butter. The makkhan row comes from a survey composition quoted in a 2020 review, discussed below.
Where does the rest of the butter go?
Into the air and into the residue. Table butter can be up to 16 per cent water, which boils off as steam, and up to 2 per cent milk solids-not-fat. An INFLIBNET dairy-technology e-text explains that, as the water is driven off, the solids-not-fat are converted into the brown ghee residue.
A 2023 review from ICAR's National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI) describes this stage: the butter is heated until the moisture has evaporated, the effervescence stops, finer air bubbles appear and the curd particles brown, usually at 115 to 120 °C. The ghee is then filtered to remove the residue.
Why does a home batch come in under the ceiling?
Because the brown residue does not give up all its fat, and some ghee is lost along the way. The particles hold on to ghee, and anything that froths over, sticks to the pan or stays in the muslin never reaches the jar. Dairy sources point to these causes:
- Fat held in the residue. In a 2023 laboratory study published in the Indian Journal of Dairy Science, ghee residue made from cow milk by the direct cream and creamery butter methods was 51.6 to 67.7 per cent fat. More than half of what you strain off can be fat.
- More solids, more residue. The NDRI review notes that white butter's lower solids-not-fat content means less ghee residue and smaller fat losses with it than when ghee is made straight from cream.
- Sour raw material. The NDDB bulletin lists the acidity of the milk or cream as a factor in yield: the higher it is, the more fat is lost in the ghee residue.
- Boil-over. The INFLIBNET e-text warns that butter froths heavily as it first heats, and the froth must be controlled to avoid losses from boiling over.
The NDDB bulletin notes that fat can be recovered from residue by dissolving it in hot water, then filtering and centrifuging. At home, letting the pan stand so the particles settle before you pour, as the bulletin advises for the village method, keeps more ghee in the jar. The residue has its own uses; our guide to using ghee residue covers what to do with it.
How does bilona butter differ from cream butter?
Bilona butter, or makkhan, is churned from fermented curd, not from fresh or aged cream. A 2020 review of makkhan research says its fat content is about the same as creamery butter's, but it carries more moisture, more curd particles and more lactic acid. Per kilogram of butter, its ceiling for ghee is similar; the flavour is not.
The review, from IIT Delhi and West Bengal University of Animal and Fishery Sciences, quotes a survey composition for makkhan of 18 to 20 per cent moisture, 78.5 to 81.3 per cent fat and 0.7 to 1.5 per cent non-fatty solids. Makkhan carries diacetyl from fermentation, it notes, and gives ghee a distinct aromatic flavour.
Where the bilona route really loses fat is earlier, in the churn. The same review reports that traditional churning recovers only 75 to 78 per cent of the milk's fat into makkhan; the rest goes into the buttermilk. That is why bilona ghee takes so much milk, even though a kilogram of makkhan has about the same ceiling for ghee as a kilogram of creamery butter. Himdhara's ghee is made this way: curd churned on a wooden bilona, the butter clarified slowly over a wood fire.
Why do published ghee yield figures disagree?
Mostly because they measure different things. The recovery figures we found in dairy texts describe whole methods, starting from milk or cream, and the desi figures include fat lost in the buttermilk. That is not how much ghee a kilogram of butter makes. The sources also differ among themselves:
- Desi (curd-churned) method. The NDRI review gives 75 to 80 per cent fat recovery. The NDDB bulletin says up to 85 per cent in one place and 80 to 85 per cent in another, while its comparison table lists 88 to 90 per cent.
- Creamery butter method. The NDDB bulletin gives 88 to 92 per cent fat recovery.
- Total fat loss. The INFLIBNET e-text's table puts it at 17 per cent for desi ghee and 8.5 per cent for the creamery butter method.
None of these is a yield from 1 kg of butter. For that, start from the butter's own fat content, as in the table above, and subtract a little for the residue. For the answer in millilitres, our article on converting ghee between litres and kilograms gives the conversion.
How can you get the most ghee from your butter?
Start with the richest butter you can, keep it from frothing over, stop at the right point, and let the residue settle before you pour. Weigh the butter going in and the ghee coming out, so you know your own yield.
- Wash homemade butter. Knead out the buttermilk in cold water first, as set out in our guide to making bilona ghee at home. Less buttermilk means less water to boil off and fewer solids in the pan.
- Use a deep, heavy pan. Leave room for the froth so nothing boils over.
- Stop when the effervescence stops and the curd particles brown. That is the end point the NDRI review describes. The NDDB bulletin warns that once the moisture has gone, the temperature spurts up quickly.
- Settle, then decant. Let the pan stand so the particles sink, pour off the clear ghee carefully, then strain the rest through muslin.
The short version
A kilogram of butter can give at most as much ghee as it holds fat: about 800 g from table butter at FSSAI's 80 per cent minimum, and about 760 g from white butter at 76 per cent. Some fat stays in the brown residue, which a laboratory study found to be more than half fat, so real batches land a little lower. Curd-churned makkhan has about the same fat as creamery butter, so it yields similarly per kilogram; the bilona route's large losses happen earlier, in the buttermilk. Ignore percentages that do not say what they are a percentage of.
Sources
Further reading behind the figures above. Himdhara's own numbers — yields, batch results — come from our production records and the batch reports on the lab reports page.
- Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (2022). Food Safety and Standards (Food Products Standards and Food Additives) Regulations, 2011 (2.1.8 Standard for Milk Fat Products; 2.1.9 Standard for Butter). FSSAI compendium, version XXVI.
- National Dairy Development Board (2020). Technology of Ghee manufacturing. Technews, Issue No. 99.
- Kumbhare S, Prasad W, Khamrui K, Wani AD, Sahu J (2023). Recent innovations in functionality and shelf life enhancement of ghee, clarified butter fat. Journal of Food Science and Technology.
- Halder K, Sahu JK, Naik SN, Mandal S, Bag SK (2020). Improvements in makkhan (traditional Indian cultured butter) production: a review. Journal of Food Science and Technology.
- Sangama AA, Sharma M, Menon Rekha Ravindra, Jayaraj Rao K, Laxmana Naik N (2023). Quality attributes of ghee residue prepared using Deoni and Holstein Friesian crossbred cow milk as influenced by method of preparation. Indian Journal of Dairy Science.