A sauce is needed to give the finishing touch to most entrees, and, without doubt, it is the sauce that makes or mars the dish. A perfect sauce is a marvel of smoothness, glossiness and flavor, but the perfect sauce is not an every-day attainment.

There are few sauces in which flavor is not largely secured by the use of rich, concentrated meat or fish broths. These broths are made consistent by means of starch cooked in butter. The name roux is given to starch thus cooked. Brown, blond and white roux are mentioned by some chefs, others make no distinction between the blond and white mixtures, the perceptible difference being too slight to be given much attention, as in blond roux the cooking is arrested before the flour has changed color in the least. The starch in a blond roux is more thoroughly cooked than it is in the white mixture.

We usually consider that all sauces thickened with roux may be classed under either one or the other of the two grand or "mother" sauces: brown or Espagnole sauce, made of brown stock and thickened with brown roux, and veloute sauce, made of veal broth and thickened with blond or white roux. Having on hand these foundation sauces, as a base, other ingredients may be added to secure such variety of sauce as is desired. This procedure is common in large households where much fine cooking is done. These sauces may be kept about a week in winter, but in summer scalding is necessary as often as every other day.

In small families these sauces are not often kept on hand, but the variety of sauce desired is made quickly, without waiting for the sauce to despumate, or become cleared. This despumation, however, is just what is needed to reader a sauce wholesome, and to give it the smoothness and glossiness inseparable to a fine sauce. A really choice brown sauce calls for six or eight hours of cooking. The sauce need not be completed in one day; it may be cooked two or three hours and then set aside until another day. Stock must be added once or twice to make up for that lost by evaporation, for this prolonged cooking is carried on simply to clarify the sauce. By pushing a bit of iron under one side of the saucepan so that boiling is confined to one spot, a separation takes place and the cooked butter and other inert bodies that detract from the clearness of the sauce are thrown up on the surface and can be skimmed off.

The basis of these mother sauces is roux, made of flour cooked in butter. Starch is the only compound in the flour that is needed in a sauce, and it is claimed by Escoffier, Favre and other French chefs of authority derived from long practical experience that, if starch in a purer form were used, the making of a fine sauce could be compassed in one hour. If nothing but pure starch were used, but half the bulk now taken would be needed and the quantity of butter could be cut down accordingly.

Temperature Of Roux And Broth When Combined

Both on account of flavor and of ease in preparation either the roux or the liquid should be comparatively cold before being combined. If the roux be just finished and hot, pour on part of the liquid cold, stir and cook until smooth, then the rest of the liquid may be hot when added.