Ghee Lab

Is my ghee pure?

Answer 7 questions about your jar and we show what looks fine, what is a red flag, and what to do next. No home check can prove ghee is pure. It can catch the obvious fakes, and tell you when a lab test is worth paying for.

Only one check here, the iodine test, is FSSAI's own household test for ghee. The rest are label, price, and kitchen checks, and each one says so.

Does the pack show an FSSAI licence number that you can find on foscos.fssai.gov.in?

1 · Label

The licence number is 14 digits, printed near the FSSAI logo. Type it into the FoSCoS licence search: the name and address should match the maker on the pack.

Where did this jar come from?

2 · Where you bought it

Loose ghee has no label to hold anyone to. On a marketplace, the seller name matters more than the brand name.

Does the label say Bilona, A2, curd-churned, or name a desi breed like Gir?

3 · Label

These claims cost the most to live up to, so they are the ones worth checking against the price.

What did you pay, and for how much ghee?

4 · Price

We turn it into a price per litre and compare it with the September 2026 Ghee Price Index.

Iodine test: put ½ teaspoon of ghee in a clear glass bowl and add 2 to 3 drops of tincture of iodine. What happened?

5 · FSSAI home test

This is FSSAI's own household test for ghee and butter (DART). Tincture of iodine is sold at chemists. It catches mashed potato, sweet potato, and other starch. It does not catch vegetable oil or vanaspati.

Melt a spoonful, pour it into a small bowl, and keep it in the fridge for 30 minutes. How did it set?

6 · Kitchen check

Not an FSSAI test. Ghee sets through evenly, soft or grainy. A clear oily layer that stays liquid on top can mean another fat was mixed in, but temperature can fool this check, so it is only a hint.

Warm a spoonful. How does it smell?

7 · Kitchen check

Not an FSSAI test. Good ghee smells of toasted milk when warm. Sour or paint-like means the fat is old or went off. A chemical or plain-oil smell is a hint of mixing.

Why price is one of the checks

Curd / Bilona ghee takes far more milk per kilo than dairy ghee. In our kitchen, 30 to 35 litres of Gir cow milk make 1 kg of cow ghee. So the price floor is real. In our September 2026 Ghee Price Index, the cheapest cow ghee sold as curd or Bilona cost ₹1,652 a litre, and dairy cow ghee a median ₹720. For buffalo ghee the same figures were ₹1,279 and ₹732. A jar that claims Bilona or A2 at a dairy price is not proof of fraud, but it is a reason to look harder.

What only a lab can check

Ask a food testing lab (FSSAI-notified or NABL-accredited) to test the sample against the FSSAI standard for ghee. These five results are the ones that matter to you. The last two are what catch vegetable oil and vanaspati, which no home test reliably can.

Milk fat

At least 99.5%

Moisture

At most 0.5%

Free fatty acids (as oleic acid)

At most 2.0%

Baudouin test (catches vanaspati)

Negative

β-sitosterol (catches vegetable oil)

Absent

We test our own ghee every month against these same limits. See how we make and test it, or read the longer guide to identifying pure ghee.

Questions about checking ghee at home

Sources

  1. DART: Detect Adulteration with Rapid Test. Milk and milk products, Test 4: Detection of mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes and other starches in ghee/butter, Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), Eat Right India. Checked 26 Sep 2026.
  2. Food Safety and Standards (Food Products Standards and Food Additives) Regulations, Chapter 2.1: Dairy products and analogues, version 01.09.2023, Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI). Checked 25 Sep 2026.

Want a jar you can see being made?

We cook your jar after you order and send you the video. Or visit us in Gir Somnath and watch a batch.

Gir cow ghee Buffalo ghee