By now my regular readers know of my aversion to mayonnaise. It’s time to explain my dislike of cream sauces, or bêchamel to the classically trained.
White sauces were big in my mother’s recipe repertoire when I was a kid. Maybe it was because Grandma was a home ec teacher before she got married. Mom used to make the sauces herself before she discovered the joys of condensed cream of mushroom soup. There was also the occasional creamed chipped beef on toast, lovingly known by military personnel as (rhymes with snit) on a shingle.
When I got to seventh grade, there was the mandatory home economics class for girls. We had to memorize the proportions of flour and milk for thin, medium, and thick white sauces. There’s a reason so many of my generation became feminists: Home ec as it was taught back in the day did not hold our interest. Even diagramming sentences was more fun. It put me off cooking for years until I got into college and had to cook for myself and my roommates. Still, white sauces rarely make an appearance in my cuisine.
What do I use for sauces? Salsas, tomato sauces, and non-starch-thickened sauces, mostly. We make a mean chimichurri for steaks. Pesto is a favorite in the summer, especially if made with my crop of basil. We also make a mint sauce for lamb that’s just red wine vinegar, sugar, and fresh mint. They usually have much more flavor and have fewer calories than gravy or white sauce. They also don’t mask what you pour them over. If I’m going to put forth the effort to make a sauce, I’m going to make one I like.
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