Mother Sauces Extended: Mustard Sauce / Normandy Sauce

Mandatory Credit: Ludovic Hirlimann

As we move forward and take a look at out next sauce, it is actually the last one that we will look at as far as the Bechamel sauce is concerned.  We will also move on to the veloute sauce and a couple of variations that can be done off of it.  Remember the veloute sauce is the basic roux with a chicken, fish or veal stock that is added to it.  But first, we will take a look at the mustard sauce with a Bechamel base.

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The mustard sauce is a very easy variation on the Bechamel and requires the addition of one ingredient.  This is a great sauce for vegetables, but can also be used with eggs and chicken.

The mustard sauce is made by combining your Bechamel sauce and 1/4 cup of prepared mustard.  Mix until it is mixed well and there you have it;  Mustard Sauce.  Told you it was easy.

Now we will move to veloute sauces and check out their variations.  We will first take a look at the Normandy sauce.  As a refresher, to make a veloute sauce you will take your roux and add 6 cups of fish stock.

For a Normandy sauce, this sauce will be used primarily for fish and seafood, but it is basically a fish veloute that has sauteed mushrooms added to it and thickened with a liaison, which is egg yolks and heavy cream.

Here are the ingredients we will need for the Normandy Sauce.

2 cups fish velouté

¼ cup fish stock

½ cup chopped mushrooms

½ cup heavy cream

2 egg yolks

1½ Tbsp butter

To stat you will take the butter and melt it in a heavy bottomed sauce pan.  Add the mushrooms and saute until they are soft.  Then add the veloute and the extra fish stock and bring to a boil.  You will then lower the heat to a simmer and reduce the sauce by 1/3.

Make the liaison mixture in a secondary bowl, beating the eggs and heavy cream until well mixed and smooth.  We will now mix the veloute and the liaison together Now, because of the eggs, there may be a tendency for the eggs to become scrambled and curdle, for lack of a better word.  The easiest way to do this it to temper the eggs.

Tempering the eggs is a technique where you slowly heat the egg mixture up so they don’t scramble.  I use this technique when I make Rice Pudding.  To do this, you will slowly and by small amounts, add the veloute to the liaison and mix.  Keep doing this until the liaison is close to the same temp as the veloute and then you can add the liaison to the veloute and mix well.  This should prevent the eggs from scrambling.

After bringing the sauce back up to a simmer, not to a boil, you will then strain the sauce and add the remaining better.  The recipe will make about 2 cups of Normandy sauce.