Sauce Primer - Oh the places you'll go!

Among the many fun classes at culinary school: knife skills, butchery, ice carving, mixology, garde manger - stocks and sauces class was among my favorites. "To be a good chef is to be a good saucier", they told us at Johnson & Wales. Oh the possibilities from 6 foundational or basic sauces. Like one of my favorite Dr. Suess books, Oh the Places You'll Go , master these sauces and you can build a world of flavor. Anyone who enjoys mac and cheese is also enjoying a Mornay sauce which is built from a Bechemel - the first of the foundational sauces -then comes Veloute, Hollandaise, Espagnole, Demi-glace and Tomato. With the anticipation of the first, local Spring asparagus building, I am drooling over the thought of grilled asparagus drizzled with Hollandaise. And at the height of tomato season this Summer, when you have more tomatoes than you know what to do with, a project of making Tomato Sauce for preserving in Ball jars (or "putting up" as they say in the south) for the Winter months is so worth the effort. But as foundational as these sauces are, the foundation to all of them, except Hollandaise, is stock. Homemade stock is the ultimate in comfort food and basic cooking (see my recipes for beef and chicken stock in the blog feed). Anyone can make stock.

If you are determined to waste less and eat healthier by buying local and doing more of your own cooking (banishing the boxes of food and opting for fresh and farm raised food) then learning these sauces is the next step on the journey. Remember that a roux is equal parts of fat and flour, mixed together to make a "paste", and used as a thickening agent. Clarified butter is often used as the fat but other fats are used as well (clarified butter is made by melting the butter and removing the white milk solids, leaving the clarified oil). Here are the basic components of each foundational sauce:

1. Bechemel - milk thickened with a roux

2. Veloute - white stock (chicken, veal, fish) thickened with a roux

3. Hollandaise - clarified butter thickened with eggs

4. Espagnole - brown stock thickened with roux and cooked with bacon, vegetables and tomato puree

5. Demi-glace - brown stock, Espagnole sauce, madeira wine and bouquet garni with tarragon

6. Tomato - salt pork rendered, vegetables, seasonings, tomatoes, puree, wine, stock and pork bones simmered and strained

From here you can make a proper Sauce Champignons, or Mushroom Sauce made with demi-glace. Bernaise Sauce is Hollandaise with the addition of tarragon, shallots and white wine. Newburg Sauce, Sauce Normandie, Sauce Soubise (onion sauce) and Admiral Sauce are all white sauces made from either veloute or bechamel. There are even more brown sauces. Oh the places you'll go, all over France, getting to know history and culture with each sauce. But more importantly, you'll be cooking for yourself, supporting local farms and farmers and impressing your friends with your new skills.

Since I mentioned grilled asparagus and Hollandaise, here is the Classic Hollandaise sauce recipe. Since this sauce is very high in fat, I make it as a special treat (hint, hint, Mother's Day). I'll admit that I have never understood why Eggs Benedict is served with Hollandaise - eggs with egg and butter sauce. Call 911. But drizzled over Spring vegetables makes more sense to me. I will provide a recipe for the next 5 sauces over the next week along with their offshoot or compound sauces. I hope you will make them or at least some of them and feel very good about your new knowledge. Enjoy!

Classic Hollandaise

Traditionally if you are serving the sauce over fish, your liquid would be a white wine reduction. If you are serving the sauce over vegetables, your liquid would be water. Obviously the white wine reduction would add delicious flavor and complexity. So I would say, if you have the time, make the reduction regardless of what you are serving the sauce with. If you are short on time, use water.

White wine reduction - 5 oz white wine, 1 oz lemon juice, 1 shallot diced, 2 pinches of freshly ground pepper, 2 bay leaves placed in a small sauce pan and bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer and reduce the volume by half. Strain, cool and refrigerate. Must be cold to use in recipe.

Sauce - makes 1 quart (can be halved)

10 egg yolks

10 tablespoons of cold reduction or 8 tablespoons cold water with 2 tablespoons lemon juice

25 ozs clarified butter (just over 3 cups)

salt to taste

Prepare a double boiler or a heat proof bowl over a pot of just simmering water. In a bowl, whip egg yolks with a whisk until they change color/lighten to pale yellow. Whisk in cold reduction or water. Place over a double boiler (do not let the water in the sauce pan touch the bowl, be careful not to let the mixture get too hot or the eggs will scramble) and whisk in clarified butter very slowly in a drizzle, whisking constantly, until thickened, doubled in volume and just cooked. Remove from heat. Season with salt to taste.