HOW TO THICKEN SAUCES

Photo by Vlad Kutepov on unsplash

Sauce isn’t soup, but it often boils down to that.

Wet cooking (braising) in two popular modern cooking appliances—the Instant Pot and the slow cooker such as Crock-Pot—tends to render sauces that, as sauces, are thin and wan. Such may make for delicious soups, but aren’t, as a rule, a toothsome nap for the meat and vegetables.

Even standard oven-made braises often render liquids that would profit from some oomph come gravy time.

To the rescue comes a raft of ways to thicken those liquids into sauces on all fours.

Powders and flours: Cornstarch, arrowroot, common wheat flour, and the flours or powders made from potato, tapioca, chickpea—to name but a few—long have been used to thicken cooking liquids. (Gelatins and gums also can play a similar role.) Generally, it’s best to make a slurry of any of these before adding to and then heating them in the liquid at work.

Reversing the order of preparation, some cooking preparations make a roux or coat some ingredients in flour at the outset of the braise.

Some cooks aren’t attracted to starches, however, because they feel that each dilutes or even dulls the flavors and aromas that have been coaxed into the braise.

A turn on the use of flour as thickener is the French “beurre manié,” equal portions of butter and flour kneaded into a paste, then added to liquid and cooked.

Reduction: Any liquid may be boiled or evaporated of its water, or “reduced.” Deglazing a skillet with a liquid such as wine or broth, in order to scrape up those tasty brown bits after an early step in certain recipes, is a form of reduction.

But even those soupy results from a slow cooker beef pot roast profitably may be reduced in a separate skillet or saucepan and, so, thickened into a sauce.

Purée: I often simply drain in a sieve the cooking vegetables (likely onions, carrots, celery, and tomato) from a braise, and blend or purée them back into the liquid which, of course, has been saved in a saucepan, not discarded. They nicely thicken themselves and the liquid into a hearty sauce.

Butter: Save the best for last, you hedonist—“monter au beurre,” a French term that means to add butter to a liquid in order to give it more body and increase its volume. What it doesn’t say outright is that it also exponentially magnifies its awesomeness, luxuriousness, and elegance.

The cook gently whisks small amounts (what those in the U.K. so deliciously call “knobs”) of butter into a quite warm but not simmering liquid—which itself, and I would counsel so, has been reduced—until the butter melts into the liquid, slightly emulsifying it, and taking it to another order of deliciousness.

And that is the finish to this terrific recipe.

RECIPE: Braised Whole Leg Chicken
The classic chicken braise is in white wine or chicken stock, unless it’s a coq au vin style, then in red wine. Why not split the difference and braise it in the increasingly popular, now-year-‘round rosé? Of course. Makes 6 servings.

Ingredients
6 whole leg chicken legs (thighs and drumsticks unseparated)
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
Bread flour for dredging
4 tablespoons vegetable oil or ghee
2 large shallots, peeled and chopped
1 large carrot, peeled and diced
2 celery stalks, diced
1 cup rosé wine (or a mix of red and white wines, or a mix of tart cherry juice and apple juice)
2 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
2 tablespoons herbes de Provence
3 cups chicken broth
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold and in 3 pieces
2 tablespoons flat-leaf parsley leaves, chopped
Lemon rind to taste, zested or in very thin strips

Directions
Sprinkle salt and pepper on both sides of the chicken pieces and place in a closed container or plastic bag and refrigerate a few hours or overnight. When ready to cook, heat the oven to 450 degrees and place a cup (or more) of flour in a large bowl; dredge each chicken piece, shaking off excess flour and place aside.

In a large oven-proof skillet over a medium-high burner, heat the oil or ghee and brown the chicken legs on both sides until nicely colored; if necessary for space, brown in batches. Remove the chicken after it is browned, keeping back only 2 tablespoons of fat. In it, brown the shallot, carrot, and celery for 10 minutes, stirring. Add the garlic, more salt and pepper if desired, and the herbs; stir well, 2-3 more minutes.

Remove the vegetables to the side and deglaze the skillet with the wine (or juices) and evaporate most of it, scraping up any browned bits and leaving only about 1/4 cup liquid in the pan. In the skillet, arrange the vegetables so that they are in a flat layer and form a bed for the chicken pieces.

Place the chicken legs on the vegetables, skin side up, then add enough broth to the deglazing juices to come up about halfway on the chicken, not enough to cover it. Bring all this to a simmer on top of the stove, then place the skillet in the oven, uncovered. Wait 10 minutes, then turn down the oven heat to 325 degrees and cook the chicken for 35-40 minutes or until it is very tender and the skin has nicely browned, even crisped. Remove the skillet and take out the chicken legs, placing them aside in a warm spot.

Into a saucepan, strain the liquid from the skillet of its solid matter, pressing down on the solids if feasible, and skim the liquid of fat if it is significant. Reduce the sauce a bit if it is wan and thin.

Warm up the sauce and then remove it from the heat. Gently whisk in the cold pieces of butter, one at a time, until each piece melts and is incorporated into the sauce before adding the next. When the sauce is finished, serve the chicken napped with it and sprinkled with the parsley and lemon zest.