<<Disclaimer: Verify this information before applying it to your situation.>>

Today, Judith Daley <[log in to unmask]> said in her post to this
List:

>I've had a few people ask me about the Ghee that
>was in my summary on casein free margarine/butter.
>
> They were wondering if Ghee is lactose
> free.  I know that it is gluten and casein free
> but I am not sure if it lactose free.

My youngest son is highly allergic to milk proteins.  Several years ago I
contacted one of the ghee manufacturers and was told there were small
amounts of casein which still remain in ghee, and that those who were
highly allergic should not use ghee. Unfortunately, I can't find my notes
from this call, but I did find the following post from our archives:

======================================

Date:    Tue, 11 Mar 1997 10:53:07 -0600
From:    Rachele Shaw <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: <No subject given>

>Our daughter is also intolerant to casein. Over the past winter we have
>been making our own clarified butter. (The stuff you can buy smells
>awful).
>
>She does not seem to be reacting to it in the way she does to milk. We
>will be testing her for casein anti-bodies in the next few months to see
>how if any casein is getting through. To make clarified butter we melt
>it on low heat, let it cool down, carefully remove every bit of curd and
>scum that comes to the top and then decant the butterfat, i.e., leave
>the stuff that separates out at the bottom. Pour this into a plastic
>container, seal and refrigerate. The product looks and tastes like
>butter. It works well in cookies, tortes, etc. We do not have any data
>on the casein content of clarified butter. I did some searching on the
>Web but could not find anything. Does anyone have any such data?

Ghee (clarified butter) is on the Food Allergy Network list as dairy.
Beware anyone with severe milk allergies. Don't use it as the Network
states that there is milk protein in ghee.

I would like to note that I have used ghee at home with my son (now 5 1/2)
since he started on solids at 6 months.  He gets hives with dairy and has
no problem with ghee.  In fact, just yesterday I did my own skin test on
him.  I rubbed ghee on one cheek and butter on the other.  Sure enough the
butter side broke out and no reaction on the ghee side.

I have always made my own ghee from a chemists recipe and am very careful
to boil it until 245 degrees until all the water is boiled off and then all
the milk solids are coagulated.  I do not "skim off the froth."  I FILTER
it through a cloth.

Here is what the chemist found through research of food scientists to be
the chemical composition of ghee.

Triglycerides  98%
Steroids        0.5%
Fatty Acids     0.4%
Water           0.3%
Others          0.8%

"Others includes:  phospholipids, fat soluble vitamins A&E, carotenes (only
in cows ghee), volatile & non-volatile ketones and aldehydes, and traces of
charred casein, calcium, phosphorus, etc.

So there is charred casein in well filtered ghee and no one would obviously
want to use this with an anaphylactic person.

Also, our son is probably somewhat sensitive to casein since when he was 2
we gave him some powdered soy drink called Better Than Milk (made in the US
by Sovex) which said non-dairy, lactose free.  We tried a small amount on
him and no reaction.  The next day gave him more and his face blew up.  It
had sodium caseinate in it and I didn't realize the caseinate connectin to
dairy.  The company refunded my money and wrote a letter of apology but
they still put it in their flavored versions although not in their plain
version.

Rachele Shaw
[log in to unmask]

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If anyone has additional information on proteins in ghee, please post it

Bill Elkus