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Gravy for Grills and Broils

A savory gravy made with butter, flour, stock, ketchup, lemon, mustard, anchovy essence, pepper, cayenne, capers, and shallot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Capers and shallot match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 405 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Gravy for Grills and Broils

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gravy

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Stir in the flour until well combined.

  3. Add the stock, ketchup, lemon juice and rind, mustard, essence of anchovies, pepper, cayenne, capers, and shallot.

  4. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 5-6 minutes.

Finish and serve

  1. Strain the gravy and serve.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Capers + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together405 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Mustard + caperstop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together624 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Mustard + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together859 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Lemon + caperstop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,222 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Butter
Enriches the gravy with fat and helps carry flavour.
Flour
Thickens the butter and stock into a smooth gravy.
Stock
Forms the liquid base that the gravy simmers in.
Shallot
Adds a mild, sharp onion-like aroma and savoury depth.
Capers
Add a sharp, briny acidity that brightens the gravy.

The step that matters

Adding the flour to the butter. Flour must be fully stirred into the melted butter so no lumps form when the stock goes in. Cooking the flour briefly in fat lets it thicken evenly once liquid is added.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, ketchup, mustard, pepper, capers, shallot):

  1. Lemonthe original
  2. Limefits about as well
  3. Avocadofits about as well
  4. Raisinfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, ketchup, mustard, pepper, capers, shallot. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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