Béchamel Sauce

This works as a white sauce for lasagne or alternatively add cheddar to make a sauce for Macaroni Cheese.

Ingredients

• 1 pint of milk
• 40 grams of plain flour (or corn flour)
• 40 grams of butter
• Salt and white pepper
• Black pepper
• A little freshly grated nutmeg

Béchamel sauce

Method

• Melt the butter in a saucepan.
• Once melted sieve in the flour.
• Take the pan of the heat and gradually stir in the milk.
• Return to the pan to the heat and bring to the boil, stir regularly to ensure the sauce doesn’t go lumpy.
• Bring the pan back to a simmer and season with salt, white pepper and nutmeg.

Tomato sauce

This is my recipe for a versatile tomato sauce (not of the Ketchup variety) that can be used for Lasagne, Bolognese, Meatballs, and Pizza or as a dipping sauce, try pureeing and serving with my Brazilian cheese breads for a tasty snack.

The Mother Sauces

Culinary experts suggest that mastering the five mother sauces of French cuisine is an essential skill for one to be truly considered a good cook.

In the early 1800s noted French chefs, Marie-Antonie Carême and Auguste Escoffier catered for Europe’s royalty and elite and created five primary sauces which form the basis for most other sauces… although I am guessing HP and Ketchup are exceptions to this rule.

On my quest to become a truly good cook (and one day culinary expert), I am setting myself the mother of all challenges; mastering all five sauces.

Admittedly the words ‘classical’ and ‘French’ frighten me, but looking at the list of my fears have been somewhat alleviated…

Five Mother Sauces:

• Béchamel
• Velouté
• Espagnole
• Hollandaise
• Tomate

Already I can make Tomato, Béchamel and possibly an Espagnole – this seems to be a brown roux and sounds like a fancy name for gravy.

Over the next few weeks this section will be updated with a recipe for each of the sauces allowing you all to chart my progress from amateur gravy maker to master sauce creator.