I decided to make some clarified butter tonight for the first time and had an interesting experience. I had melted the butter over low heat like the drill-down video says, and had already spooned off most of the foam. I noticed that a few pieces were still floating up, so I decided to give it another minute or two. There was no simmering action, boiling... nada. All of a sudden, the butter "exploded," cleared the pot by about four inches and then was almost at a rolling boil.

All's well in the kitchen (a bit messy maybe) and the butter turned out fine... just wondering what might have caused it to do that. Anyone else had this happen?

Wow! Never seen that happen before. But my guess is that some pressure was building up under the foam. This also happens with stocks, especially when clarifying consommes. Perhaps start skimming a bit sooner.

Also, make sure your butter is of good quality. Cheaper ones have more water in them, which can cause more spitting...in your case a mean cough.

I didn't have exactly this experience but it didn't go the way it did in the video either. I heated the unalted butter slowly over low heat as in the video, spooning off anything rising to the top. But my butter was not getting clear like in the video, it was still murky. In the video once the solids at the top are removed there is a clear layer of butterfat and then solids at the bottom. I couldn't see the bottom of the pot (I was using a 1 qt saucepan with 1 lb of butter, if that makes a difference in understanding what I was doing). I checked the temperature of the butter and it was about 145F so I thought maybe I just needed a bit more heat to help the butterfat to separate. I heated it and my butter didn't explode but I did get some large bubbles coming up, the way you do when heating oatmeal for example. I took the temperature and it was around 200F. I let it simmer like this a few minutes hoping the butter would clear up but it never did, so I poured it thru a cheesecloth into a container and stopped pouring when I get near the end at which time I could see some residual stuff at the bottom of the pot.

I guess I'm puzzled why it didn't work for me the way it did in the video; I mean you can't really get simpler than this, one ingredient and one procedure (heating) and yet I didn't seem to get it right! Any advice?

The butter may not necessarily always look exactly the same as in the video. In fact, many things may differ depending on many factors. The main thing to focus on is that the butter separates into the 3 parts - the foam, the clarified butter and the milk solids.

Sounds like you achieved this early on and there was likely no need to turn up the heat. Again, the more you practice the more comfortable you will become each time you practice something. Keep up the good work. Cheers!