How to Make a Good Sauce: Chefs' Core Principles and a Pan Sauce Recipe
The culinary publication "The Culinary Pro" has outlined the basic principles of sauce-making, from building a flavour base and reducing to adjusting consistency and storing. The material includes a recipe for a pan sauce with mushrooms and cream.
Sauces give a dish flavour, moisture and texture, and help tie the elements on a plate together. According to the culinary publication "The Culinary Pro", most small sauces rely on reduction: liquids are simmered with aromatics, wine and herbs so that the flavours blend and become more concentrated.
Types of sauce
In French cooking, the foundation sauces, known as "Grande" sauces, such as "Espagnole", "Bechamel" and "Velouté", are made on a stock or milk base. Adding further ingredients to them produces the small sauces. A pan sauce, by contrast, is made in the same pan used to cook meat, poultry or fish, using the caramelised bits stuck to the pan and the juices released.
Stages of preparation
The cook first sautés or sweats aromatic vegetables, such as shallots and garlic, in butter or oil. Stock, milk or wine is then added and simmered gently. The sauce can be thickened with a "roux" (a mixture of flour and fat) or starch, though tomato sauces often thicken on their own. To keep a sauce clear, foam and impurities are skimmed off regularly.
The right consistency is called "nappé": the sauce should coat the back of a spoon. A sauce that is too thin can be simmered longer or enriched with a thickener, cream or butter, while one that is too thick can be thinned with water or stock. Flavour is balanced by considering saltiness, sweetness, sourness, bitterness and "umami". At the end, a small amount of butter can enrich the sauce and give it a sheen.
Storage
A sauce prepared in advance may form a skin on its surface. This can be prevented with melted butter, buttered baking paper, or cling film pressed directly onto the surface.
Recipe: pan sauce with mushrooms
Ingredients: 150 g button mushrooms, one small shallot, a garlic clove, 100 ml dry white wine, 200 ml beef or poultry stock, 100 ml cream, a tablespoon of butter, salt, pepper and thyme.
After cooking the meat, pour off excess fat from the pan. Fry the mushrooms and shallot in half the butter for 3–5 minutes, then add the garlic and thyme. Pour in the wine, scrape the bottom of the pan and let it reduce by half. Add the stock and simmer for about 5 minutes. Finally, stir in the cream, turn off the heat, and add the remaining butter, salt and pepper.
