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Sauce

Sauce Blanche Ordinaire

A simple white sauce made with butter, flour, water, vinegar, salt, and nutmeg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,623 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Sauce Blanche Ordinaire

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter over low heat.

  2. Whisk in the flour and salt until smooth.

  3. Gradually add the water and vinegar, stirring constantly.

  4. Add the grated nutmeg and continue to thicken the sauce over low heat without boiling.

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. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Butter + vinegartop 23% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,513 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  5. Vinegar + nutmegtop 25% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,864 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Provides fat that carries flavor and gives the sauce a rich, smooth body.
Flour
Its starch swells in the warm liquid and thickens the sauce.
Water
Forms the liquid base that the flour thickens into a pourable sauce.
Vinegar
Adds a little acidity that brightens the flavor of the rich butter.

The step that matters

Thicken without boiling. Starch thickens as it heats in the liquid, but boiling can break down its thickening power and make the sauce thin or uneven. Gentle, steady heat keeps it smooth.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, vinegar):

  1. Jalapenofits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, vinegar. 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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