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Brown Gravy

A simple gravy made by reducing fat, flour, and boiling water, seasoned with salt, cayenne, and Worcestershire sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Brown Gravy

Why it works: Flour and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 18% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,078 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Brown Gravy

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Remove all but 3 tablespoons of fat from the pan used to roast meat.

  2. Add 2 tablespoons of flour and stir rapidly until well browned.

  3. Gradually add 2 cups of boiling water, stirring until the gravy thickens.

  4. Season with salt and cayenne to taste.

  5. Add 1 teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce for improved flavor.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Flour + saucetop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,078 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

What each ingredient does

Fat
Carries flavor from the roasting pan and, with flour, forms the base that thickens the gravy.
Flour
Thickens the gravy as its starch swells in hot liquid, and browns to add color and a toasted flavor.
Boiling water
Forms the liquid body of the gravy, which thickens as the flour starch swells in it.

The step that matters

Stirring the flour until well browned. Cooking the flour in fat toasts it and builds color and flavor, but if it burns it turns bitter. Stir constantly and watch the color closely.

“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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