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Sauce

A brown sauce made with veal, ham, vegetables, wine, stock, and a roux.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 15 ingredients
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Why it works: Carrot and turnip match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,002 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Wash and peel the carrot, turnip, and onion.

  2. Cut them into small pieces and place in a stewpan with the bouquet garni, peppercorns, cloves, veal, and ham.

  3. Add 2 tablespoons of butter and stir over medium heat until light brown to create a mirepoix.

  4. Pour off the fat and moisten the mirepoix with stock, claret, sherry, and tomato pulp.

  5. Boil gently for about an hour, skimming occasionally.

Make the roux

  1. Meanwhile, prepare a brown roux by melting 3 oz. of butter in a stewpan.

  2. Stir in the flour and cook slowly over medium heat, stirring constantly until it turns chestnut brown.

  3. Allow the roux to cool slightly.

Finish and store

  1. Gradually pour in the prepared stock mixture, stirring until it boils.

  2. Let it simmer slowly for another hour, skimming well.

  3. Pass the sauce through a fine sieve.

  4. If too thick, add more stock.

  5. Stir occasionally until cool to prevent a crust from forming.

  6. Store the sauce in a stone vessel.

  7. Boil it daily if not used, adding stock if necessary.

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. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Carrot + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,873 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  3. Turnip + oniontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together7,585 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Turnip + clovetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Carrot + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together21,601 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Thickens the sauce when cooked in butter as a roux.
Butter
Enriches the mirepoix and roux, carrying flavour and helping browning.
Stock
Forms the liquid body of the sauce and sets its consistency as it reduces.
Tomato pulp
Adds acidity and colour to the sauce.
Veal
Contributes meaty flavour and body to the stock base.

The step that matters

Cooking the roux to chestnut brown. Cooking flour in fat until it browns develops nutty flavour and colour, but if it is undercooked the sauce tastes raw and floury, and if it scorches it turns bitter. Stirring constantly keeps the heat even.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (carrot, turnip, onion, veal, ham, butter, sherry):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Celeryfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against carrot, turnip, onion, veal, ham, butter, sherry. 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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