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Roux for Sauces
Roux is necessary to thicken and give body to sauces. Put one tablespoon of flour and one of butter into a saucepan and cook until the flour has lost any raw taste. Then put the saucepan on the back of the stove and add slowly the stock or milk, one cup for every tablespoon of butter or flour, and stir until smooth. For white sauces take care the flour does not color; for dark sauces let it brown, but take care it does not burn.
A standard equal-weight-by-volume roux with proportions given per cup of liquid. The whole thing turns on temperature control and how much colour you let the flour take.
- The hinge: cook the flour, don't rush the liquidGive the butter-and-flour paste two to three minutes over medium heat for a white roux, stirring constantly, until it smells faintly nutty rather than pasty. Adding liquid to a still-raw roux gives a sauce that tastes of flour no matter how long you simmer it afterwards.
- "The back of the stove"On a wood or coal range this was the cooler end of the top, well away from the firebox. On a modern hob, take the pan off the heat entirely for the first additions of liquid, then return it to medium-low once it is smooth.
- Proportions and what they give youOne tablespoon each of flour and butter to one cup of liquid is a thin pouring sauce, right for napping vegetables or thinning into soup. Double both for a medium sauce that will coat a spoon, and use three of each per cup for a binding sauce meant to hold croquettes or a soufflé base.
- Cold liquid, warm rouxThe book says to add slowly, which works. Many cooks also find a temperature difference helps: cool stock into a hot roux, whisked hard, tends to disperse the starch before it can gather into lumps.
- Brown roux takes real timeFor dark sauces, expect roughly eight to fifteen minutes of steady stirring over medium heat to reach a hazelnut colour. Browning reduces the flour's thickening power, so a brown sauce generally needs somewhat more roux for the same body.
- Simmer it outOnce smooth, hold the sauce at a bare simmer for at least five minutes, stirring. Starch granules need that time to swell fully; a sauce pulled the moment it thickens will thin again as it sits.
- YieldAs written, one tablespoon each of flour and butter with one cup of liquid makes about a cup of thin sauce — enough for four modest servings.