Mother Sauces: Veloute Sauce

Mandatory Credit: Steve Dunham

As we move through our series of Mother Sauces in classical cuisine we will also be taking a look at small sauces that can be derived from these 5 mother sauces.  Yesterday we looked at a Bechamel Sauce and two different small sauces that can come from the basis of the Bechamel; the cheddar cheese sauce and an Alfredo sauce.

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Today we will look at the second of the three primary mother sauces that use a roux as their base.  A veloute sauce is one that uses white stock and thickens in with the roux.  Your most common veloute is the chicken veloute which is chicken stock thickened with the roux and simmered for a while.

6 Cups Chicken Stock

2 T Flour

2 T butter

Now a veloute can be used to branch off into different types of other small sauces.  When you take a chicken veloute, your chicken stock and roux, and you add 1 cup heavy cream, 1 T butter salt, and lemon juice to taste, it becomes a Supreme Sauce. This is primarily used with sauteed chicken.  Now not to get to complicated but you can branch off even farther with the Supreme Sauce and make additional small sauces, but that will be another day that we dive into that area.

Back to the Veloute. Now, another veloute is the veal veloute and that is just simply switching out the chicken stock for veal stock.  A branched small sauce from the veal veloute is called an Allemande Sauce.  This can also be referred to as a German Sauce.  To make a Allemande Sauce you will take your Veal Veloute Sauce and add 1/4 cup heavy cream, 1 egg yolk, salt and lemon juice to taste.  This sauce works well with veal, chicken, vegetables and eggs. The heavy cream and egg combination is also called a liaison.

The final veloute sauce is a fish veloute sauce and is made by using fish stock rather than chicken or veal stock.  The fish Veloute is the primary basis for the white wine sauce.  To make a white wine sauce you will take the fish veloute and add in 1/2 cup heavy cream, 1/2 cup white wine, 1 T butter, salt and lemon juice to taste.  Obviously the best dishes for the white wine and the fish veloute is going to be fish and seafood dishes.

Tomorrow we will take a look at the next mother sauce; Espagnole Sauce.