The base is white.

Some meals just wouldn't be the same without a bit of sauce. Just think of Lasagna, Fish Pie or Eggs Benedict; you just wouldn't eat it without a sauce. The Romans used sauce to mask the flavour and smell of ingredients that were... let's say... less than fresh.

Did you know that there are five sauces, called mother sauces, that are the basis for most other sauces? The mother sauces are: Sauce Béchamel, Sauce Espagnole, Sauce Velouté, Sauce Hollandaise and Sauce Tomate. The reason that they are called Mother Sauce (Sauce Mere) is because each of them is the 'head of a unique family' of sauces. The sauces based on the mother sauce is called 'small sauce'. Velouté is the exception as this has three 'daughter sauces'.

1. Sauce Béchamel: milk-based sauce, thickened with a white roux
2. Sauce Espagnole: a fortified brown stock sauce, thickened with a brown roux
3. Sauce Velouté: light stock-based sauce, thickened with a roux or a liaison, a mixture of egg yolks and cream
4. Sauce Hollandaise: an emulsion of egg yolk, butter and lemon or vinegar
5. Sauce Tomate: tomato-based

So, what is a sauce exactly? In principle it is a liquid that is combined with some sort of thickening agent and flavourings. Each of the five mother sauces is made with a different liquid, and a different thickening agent — although three of the mother sauces are thickened with roux, in each case the roux is cooked for a different amount of time to produce a lighter or darker colour.

Roux is melted butter (or fat) and flour: melt butter in a pan until 'frothing', add an equal amount of plain flour and stir (using a whisk is the best method to prevent lumps) until a thick paste forms, cook at least until the raw flour taste is gone (it will start smelling biscuit-y).
How long you cook it for depends on which type of sauce you want to make. How much butter and flour you use depends on how thick you want your sauce to be:

• Pouring sauce: one tablespoon each of butter and flour to 240 millilitre of milk
• Medium sauce: two tablespoons each of butter and flour to 240 millilitre of milk
• Thick sauce: three tablespoons each of butter and flour to 240 millilitre of milk

Sauce Béchamel, or white sauce, is one of the easiest to make and seems 'boring' to a lot of people but, made well, can be very tasty and is a must if you want to make Lasagna or Fish Pie.

Sauce Béchamel

Ingredients:

• Butter
• Flour
• Milk
• Salt and white pepper
• Flavourings such as onion (studded with cloves), bay leaf and nutmeg are all optional

Method:

1. Add milk to a pan with a whole onion (studded with a few cloves) and a bay leaf and bring to a simmer
2. Remove the flavourings (if used)
3. Make a roux as above
4. Add the warm milk as soon as the roux starts smelling biscuit-y but is still white or pale-yellow
5. Whisk the milk into the roux and leave for a couple of minutes to thicken
6. Season the sauce with salt and white pepper and a pinch of nutmeg (optional)

Sauce Mornay

Make a medium sauce béchamel and add 60 gram grated gruyere. Mix the cheese well with the sauce and leave to melt.

Sauce Moutarde (or Mustard Sauce)
Make a pouring sauce béchamel and add one tablespoon of whole grain mustard. Mix the mustard into the sauce and leave for a further minute to cook off the harsh flavour.

Sauce Soubise
Heat 30 gram butter in a frying pan and add two roughly chopped onions. Fry the onions until soft and translucent. Add the onions to a blender and puree until smooth Make a medium sauce béchamel and add the onion puree.

Sauce Nantua

This is by far the most complex sauce, not because it is difficult to make but because there are several more ingredients and steps necessary to make this sauce but the effort is well worth it.

Ingredients:

• 30 gram butter
• 1 carrot, finely chopped
• 1 onion, very finely sliced
• 250 gram raw shrimp or crawfish (with shells and heads on)
• 2 tablespoons cognac
• 125 millilitre white wine
• 375 millilitre fish stock
• 2 teaspoons tomato paste
• pinch of cayenne pepper
• pinch of ground paprika (mild)
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 fresh sprig of thyme
• medium sauce béchamel

Method:

1. Heat the butter over low heat
2. Add the carrots and onions and fry for 2 minutes
3. Chop the shrimp/crawfish and add them to the pan
4. Turn up the heat and fry until the shrimp/crawfish turn bright red, about 3 minutes
5. Add the cognac and white wine and reduce the liquid by half
6. Add the stock, bring to a boil and reduce the liquid by half again
7. Add the tomato paste, cayenne, paprika, bay leaf and thyme and cook for 30 minutes
8. Stir in the medium sauce béchamel and let bubble a further 10 minutes
9. Remove the bay leaf and thyme and pour the contents of the pan into a blender and blend
10. Strain the sauce through a fine-mesh sieve, pressing with a ladle to get as much of the 'juice'
11. Pour the sauce back into a pan and return to the boil
12. Reduce the sauce by a third and season to taste with salt and white pepper

So now you have the perfect sauces but what do you use them for? Here is a list of ideas:

1. Sauce Béchamel
• Cream of ... soup - thin out the sauce with a little more milk or good stock and add fried mushrooms, asparagus, chicken, or anything else you fancy
• Lasagna
• Souflé (use the thick sauce for the best result)
• Gratins
• Meat croquettes (use the thick sauce for the best result)
2. Sauce Mornay
• Gratins
• Cheese souflé (use the thick sauce for the best result)
• Eggs
• Vegetables
• Chicken
• Seafood
• Veal Prince Orloff
3. Mustard Sauce
• Cold cooked meats
• Vegetables
• Fish
• Steak
• Pork
4. Sauce Soubise
• Vegetables
• Chicken
• Fish
• Cold roasts
5. Sauce Nantua
• Fish
• Shellfish

Four different sauces for any occasion and all based on that simple, classic, white sauce. But there are many more varieties: Parsley sauce, Crème sauce, Cheddar sauce, Mushroom sauce to name but a few.

Tomorrow I will post the next mother sauce, so stay tuned and, most importantly

Enjoy

Getting ready (or: Preparation is twice the fun)

Christmas comes but once a year and always requires planning. We all know that preparation's half the work but, for me, it is also twice the fun and I can hardly wait to start. It is the third day of November, Christmas is still 51 (!!!) days away, but I have already planned Christmas dinner.

As there is only my husband and me, I have decided against a bird but, in stead, have opted for a nice roast. Not something we usually eat as there are only two of us so it should be a nice change.

Our menu is going to look something like this:

Christmas Menu

Starter

Grilled Goats Cheese and Cranberry Compote

served with pan fried chicory

Main Course

Rose Veal 'Prince Orloff'

served with Baked Brussels Sprouts and

Goose Fat Roast Potatoes

Dessert

Mulled Wine Poached Pears

served with sweetened crème fraîche

Cheeseboard

Selection of soft and hard cheeses

served with home-made mini rolls and

roasted chestnuts, cranberry compote and onion chutney

Note to self: Invite people for Christmas dinner or we'll be eating Christmas 'dinner' for the next five days...

Veal Prince Orloff is a dish that was created by the French chef Urbain Dubois for Prince Orloff, a former Russian ambassador to France in the 1800s. It sounds impressive and tastes even better but is easy to make.

I know that many people do not like the idea of eating veal as it is often associated with animal cruelty but standards here in the UK have significantly improved over the years but some awareness is necessary. Make sure to ask your butcher for Non-formula-fed ("red" or "grain-fed") veal, Rose veal, Pasture-raised veal or Free-raised veal. If you really do not want to eat veal, you could substitute the veal for beef or venison or even pork.

Veal Prince Orloff

Ingredients:
For the meat

• 1 kilo veal (beef, venison, pork) roast
• 150 gram butter (plus extra for greasing an oven proof dish)
• 100 millilitre water
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 250 gram mushrooms, thinly sliced
• 100 millilitre cream
• 1 slice of bacon per finger-thick slice of meat
• Salt and pepper

For the sauce (Mornay)

• 20 gram butter
• 25 gram flour
• 250 millilitre gravy
• 100 gram grated cheese (extra mature cheddar is perfect) (plus extra to sprinkle on top)

Method:

For the meat

1. Season the meat all over with salt and pepper
2. Heat a frying pan on high heat, add 125 gram of the butter, let it melt and wait until it has stopped foaming
3. Add the meat to the pan and brown on all sides
4. Once browned, lower the temperature to medium, add the water and cover the pan with a lid
5. Cook the meat for approximately 1 hour, basting the meat with the juices in the pan
6. After 1 hour remove the meat (leaving the juices) from the pan and let it rest
7. Add enough water to the pan to create 250 millilitre of gravy, making sure to scrape the bottom of the pan (to get all the brown bits), and pour into a jug
8. In a separate frying pan add the rest of the butter and fry the onion until golden
9. Add the mushrooms and fry until all the liquid has evaporated
10. Season the mushroom mix with salt and pepper and add the cream, letting the cream reduce slightly
11. Grease an oven proof dish and slice the meat into 1 finger-thick slices
12. In a frying pan, fry 1 rasher of bacon per slice of meat until crispy (for 5 slices of meat, 5 rashers of bacon)
13. In the oven proof dish:
1. place 1 slice of meat
2. cover with a rasher of bacon
3. add 1 spoonful of the mushrooms (make sure to have enough for every slice of meat
4. repeat until all the meat, bacon and mushrooms have been used, in an overlapping manner (like shingles on a roof)

For the sauce (Mornay)

1. In a sauce pan, melt the butter, let it foam and brown slightly
2. Whisk in the flour and, whilst whisking, let it 'cook' until it smells like biscuits
3. Add the gravy bit by bit, whilst whisking, and let it cook and thicken for about five minutes
4. Whisk in the cheese and let it melt

To finish the dish:

1. Pour the sauce over the meat and sprinkle with some grated cheese
2. Preheat the oven to 200º Celsius
3. Bake meat in the oven for approximately 30 minutes, cover with tinfoil if it is starting to brown too quickly

The meat can be prepared a couple of days in advance and then assembled when needed. Make sure to cover everything with tinfoil and place in the fridge: remove the meat at least 1 hour before cooking from the fridge to come to room temperature otherwise the meat will be tough.

As they say in Russia

приятного аппетита

Or, in English

Enjoy