sauces

ronbyrne2005

can any one give me afew recipes for sauces for everyday meals instead of instant gravy or those packet sauces like peppercram sauce.they all contain hydrogenated vegtable oil-a source of the dreaded trans fats and also msg which is crap too.

dudara

Mustard sauce.

Fry some finely chopped onion and garlc gently until softish. Add some cream into the pan along with a spoonful of mustard and cook until thick. Goes great with pork.

BuffyBot

Basic white sauce:

250 ml milk

25g plain flour

25 g margarine/butter (butter recommended, proper block margarine if nessecary - but not spreads like Low Low etc).

1) Melt the butter/margarine in a saucepan. Add the flour using a wooden spoon and beat. .

2) Remove from the heat. Gradually add the milk, a small amount at a time, mixing it in with no lumps. The mixture will now be cool.

3) When the liquid is added, return to the heat. Stir all the time until it thickens.

For plain white sauce, add salt to taste (serve with cauliflower etc)

You can also add flavours if you like. Some grated cheese and a little english mustard makes an great cheese sauce. Chopped parsley into the basic sauce mix with some seasoning makes parsley sauce (goes great with ham, bacon or fish like cod)

Shabadu

BuffyBot's recipe above is similar to the Mother Sauce, or Grand Sauce bechemal, only you simmer an onion studded with cloves and a bayleaf in the milk to add flavour. Pepper too.

Add a grated hard cheese, or a mix, for a classic Mornay Sauce.

The other Mother sauces are Mayonnaise, Espagnole, Hollandaise & Mayonnaise, Vinaigrette.

If you have a good stock, or meat juices from a roast or panfrying, here is a simple sauce. Mix some flour into the pan juices. Add wine and stock to deglaze. Adjust seasoning and whisk in a spoon of redcurrant jelly.

A stock cube will also do.

To make a jus, brown some shallots/onions and garlic. Add in glug of red wine & splash of balsamic. Add some stock. Add bouquet garnis of rosemary, thyme etc. Reduce, then sieve.

Yummy.


Here is my recipe for pepper sauce: http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=2623011&postcount=4

ronbyrne2005

cheers folks

The Sweeper

If you're simmering things in milk to add a flavour (e.g. peppercorns, onion, bayleaves, cloves, nutmeg etc) it's better to simmer, strain and let the milk cool completely before using it because milk and water used in sauces should always be cold (unless otherwise specified) and then heated as part of the sauce cooking process.

I find that flour-n-butter based sauces are best made in a non-stick pan and over a low heat - you need to cook the flour without burning it and in a steel pan it'll end up coating the bottom of the pan and burning onto it.

Gravies are very difficult to make if you haven't just roasted something that you can use the roasting juices from. They need forward planning involving home-made stock, your freezer, an ice-cube tray and patience. On the very rare occasions that I'm organised enough to do this, I make very good stock (one that turns to jelly rather than liquid when cooled), force it into ice-cube bags and freeze it. The gravy is then a little melted butter and some cold water in a non-stick pan, add flour (similar amounts of flour and butter/water mix. e/g a heaped teaspoon butter, a table spoon water, a table spoon flour), thicken and cook the flour, drop frozen stock icecube into 1/4 pint hot water (I go half n half boiling and from the tap), add stock water to pan, stirring all the while. Season with salt and pepper, white or red wine, for red meats, add mustard to taste, use your imagination.

For offal meats (sausages, liver) I'll make an onion gravy by caramelising some onion rings in a different pan and then pouring the made gravy over them, deglazing the pan with the liquid.

It has to be said though, I work around 60 hours a week so this level of preparation tends to make an appearance on bank holiday weekends, annual leave and in my dreams.

Freelancer

Adding a spoonful of port also helps a gravy immensely.....

Gordon

For white sauce and cheese sauce I prefer to use cornflour. Can't give the quantities as I do it by hand but it's so much lighter than the flour and butter technique.

Shabadu

The starch in cornflour will break down after you reheat it though, it has very high amylose and low amylopectin levels.

If you make a mornay w/ cornflour for a lasagne, and heat it up the next day, the sauce will lose it's thickness.