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Veloute
To 1 cupful of white stock add 1/4 cupful of cream, and heat. Cook 3 tablespoonfuls of flour in 3 tablespoonfuls of butter; add the stock slowly, season with 1/4 teaspoonful salt, a little grated nutmeg, a dash of cayenne, a sprig of parsley--if mushrooms are on hand, add a few, to give flavor. Simmer one hour, strain, and serve.
A classic white sauce built on a cooked roux, thick enough to nap poached shellfish. The proportions are heavier than a modern velouté, and the hour-long simmer needs managing.
- White stockMeans an unbrowned veal or chicken stock, made from bones blanched rather than roasted. Unsalted chicken stock is the practical substitute; if it is heavily salted, hold back the quarter teaspoon of salt until the end.
- Roux proportionThree tablespoons each of flour and butter to a cup and a quarter of liquid is appreciably more roux than a modern velout\tablespoons per cup, and will give a stiff sauce. For a pouring consistency use one and a half tablespoons of each per cup of liquid.
- Cook the flour properlyThe instruction to cook the flour in the butter is the hinge. Let it bubble two to three minutes over low heat without colouring, or the finished sauce tastes of raw paste. Add the warm stock in stages, whisking smooth between additions.
- The hour of simmeringThat long cook is there to drive off any raw flour flavour and let the impurities rise for skimming, but at this thickness a saucepan on the direct flame can scorch. Use the lowest possible heat with the pan set slightly off-centre, skim the skin that gathers on the cool side, and thin with more stock as it reduces. A double boiler is a safer alternative and needs less watching.
- CreamHeating the cream with the stock helps it combine without splitting. Whipping or heavy cream is closest to what was meant; single cream will still work but gives a thinner sauce.
- MushroomsA few white or cremini mushrooms, sliced and dropped in for the simmer, give the faint earthiness this sauce is after. They are strained out at the end, so appearance does not matter. Mushroom trimmings and stalks do the same job.
- StrainingPush it through a fine sieve rather than a colander, both to catch the parsley and mushroom and to break up any lumps. A few grains of cayenne and the nutmeg should be tasted for again after straining, as long cooking mutes them.
- Yield and useAbout a cup of finished sauce, enough for four servings of poached oysters, scallops or shrimp, or as the base for a shellfish gratin. It thickens further as it cools; loosen with hot stock or cream before serving.
Velout")0me grouped as the foundations of French cookery in the early nineteenth century, later codified by Escoffier as one of the mother sauces: a pale stock thickened with a blond roux, as against b\ffff9chamel's milk or espagnole's browned base. The name simply means "velvety." French sauce vocabulary had entered English-language cookbooks of this kind, usually stripped of its restaurant apparatus and reduced to a single workable page. Made with a fish or oyster liquor in place of the white stock, the same sauce serves as the basis for creamed shellfish dishes in books of this period.