Gravy — the real Mother (and Father) sauce

[Mike Nolan]

Classically trained chefs, please stop reading this column now. OK, you've been warned. In classic French cooking there are five mother sauces, as first set forth by Marie-Antoine Carême and later rev
[See the full post at: Gravy - the real Mother (and Father) sauce]

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[BakerAunt]

Thanks for a great article, Mike. Like you, I always have chicken/turkey stock in the freezer

Lately, I've been using regular ClearJel, rather than flour, to thicken my gravies. I also find that a flat whisk is most helpful.

[Mike Nolan]

I generally use a 'granny fork', though for larger quantities of gravy (like when I'm making a big batch of chicken pot pies), I'll use a silicone spatula.

Back when we were first married, my wife was thickening some gravy with cornstarch, and got some lumps, probably because she added the cornstarch directly to the gravy rather than make a slurry. I showed her how to beat the lumps out with a granny fork. A few months later we were visiting her mother and my wife said something about how I had shown her how to get lumps out of gravy.

Her mother simply said, "I never get lumps in gravy."

[KIDPIZZA]

Mike Nolan wrote:

Classically trained chefs, please stop reading this column now. OK, you’ve been warned. In classic French cooking there are five mother sauces, as first set forth by Marie-Antoine Carême and later rev[See the full post at: Gravy – the real Mother (and Father) sauce]

MIKE:
Good afternoon. Being that I wasn't able to locate your mentioning the five (5)
MOTHER SAUCES I thought I would post them for anyone who would like to know their formal names.

COMES NOW:
(1) BECHAMEL SAUCE
(2) HOLLANDAISE SAUCE
(3) VELOUTE SAUCE
(4) SAUCE ESPAGNOLE
(5) TOMATO SAUCE

I hope my spelling is correct. I remember it like this from my lessons at culinary college many many years ago. The course was COOKING #101 & GARDE MANGE.

HAVE A NICE DAY.

~CASS/ KIDPIZZA.

Mike Nolan wrote:

I generally use a ‘granny fork’, though for larger quantities of gravy (like when I’m making a big batch of chicken pot pies), I’ll use a silicone spatula.

Ba3)ck when we were first married, my wife was thickening some gravy with cornstarch, and got some lumps, probably because she added the cornstarch directly to the gravy rather than make a slurry. I showed her how to beat the lumps out with a granny fork. A few months later we were visiting her mother and my wife said something about how I had shown her how to get lumps out of gravy.

Her mother simply said, “I never get lumps in gravy.”

[Mike Nolan]

The original article does list them.

Of the five mother sauces, espagnole is seldom used except as a base for other sauces. I made it once as part of making a batch of demi-glace. a task that took about 2 1/2 days. It's interesting that of the two dozen or so trained chefs that I know, NONE of them have ever made demi-glace from scratch, not even back in cooking school. Most chefs who use demi-glace buy concentrated demi-glace for use in their kitchens.

Michael Ruhlman does talk about the process of making demi-glace in his book, "The Making of a Chef".

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