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Walnut Sauce
Mix one tablespoonful of flour in one pint of cold water, and stir it over the fire until boiling; put in a lump of butter, stir until the butter has dissolved, then squeeze in a small quantity of lemon juice. Chop some pickled walnuts, put them into the sauce, allow them to simmer all together for a few minutes, then serve.
A thin, sharp brown-flecked sauce of the old English school, built on pickled walnuts rather than stock. It comes together in under ten minutes, and the main decisions the original leaves to you are quantity and consistency.
- The walnuts are the whole pointPickled walnuts are whole green walnuts, picked before the shell hardens, cured in brine and steeped in spiced malt vinegar until black and soft. They are still sold in jars, mostly by British brands and at specialty grocers; there is no real substitute, though a little of the jar liquor will boost the sauce if the flavour reads flat.
- A pint here is 16 fl ozOscar's book uses American measure, so a pint is two cups. One tablespoon of flour to two cups of water is a very loose sauce, barely napping consistency. If you want something that clings to sliced beef, use three to four tablespoons of flour for the same liquid.
- "A lump of butter"Read this as one to two tablespoons. The original adds it on the fire and stirs until it dissolves; if you prefer, take the pan off the boil and stir it in smoothly.
- Slake the flour firstMixing flour into cold water and heating works only if the flour is fully dispersed before the pan goes on the heat. Whisk it to a smooth slurry and keep whisking as it comes up, or you will be straining out lumps.
- Water, not stockThe original thickens plain water. Substituting beef or veal stock gives a richer sauce, and you can then skip or reduce the lemon.
- Salt is not mentionedNothing in the list is seasoned except the walnuts, which are salty and vinegary in a variable way depending on the jar. Taste after the walnuts have simmered, then salt and add pepper.
- Simmering time"A few minutes" is enough to bleed the walnut colour and spice into the sauce. Much longer and the chopped walnuts break down into grit; five minutes at a bare simmer is plenty.
- Yield and servingTwo cups of liquid makes eight to ten servings of sauce. It belongs with roast or boiled beef, mutton, venison, or cold meats, and is served hot in a boat rather than poured over.
Pickled walnuts are one of the oldest surviving English condiments, put up in high summer when the immature nut can still be pierced through with a needle, and by the eighteenth century they were a staple of the country still-room alongside walnut ketchup, which is essentially the same fruit reduced to a black spiced liquor. Sauces built on them accompanied beef and game for generations before Oscar Tschirky set one down in his 1896 collection. Its presence in a New York hotel book is a reminder of how thoroughly the Waldorf's repertoire mixed French and English cookery: the technique here is a plain roux-less thickening of the kind English cookery books had long taught, dressed with an ingredient rarely found in French sauce work.