Plain White Sauce Recipe
Plain White Sauce Recipe with Butter, Plain Flour, Milk and Salt.
INGREDIENTS
1 oz (25g) Butter
1 oz (25g) Plain Flour
1/2 pint (300ml) Milk
Good Pinch of Salt
METHOD
Melt the butter in a saucepan over a very gentle heat - do not let it boil - then very gradually stir in the flour. Use a wooden spoon, and be very careful to keep the mixture perfectly smooth. This can only be accomplished by adding a little flour at a time. The heat must be very gentle, as this mixture must not acquire any colour.
Add the salt. Continue stirring until the butter has absorbed the other ingredients and no dry flour remains. You should now have a smooth, even paste that can be lifted out, if necessary, leaving the saucepan quite clean. This is called a "white roux".
The next step is to add the milk. Use a jug with a good spout and pour it in very slowly, stirring well all the time over a gentle heat. If the mixture appears in the least lumpy, remove the saucepan from the heat and beat with a wooden spoon until it is quite smooth before adding more milk.
Practice makes perfect in the art of mixing, and after a few times you will find no difficulty in keeping your sauce smooth. Stir until it boils, then simmer for ten minutes so that the flour is cooked.
Some cooks imagine when the sauce boils it is done - a fatal mistake and the cause of the raw taste of flour so often found in sauces.
Now for the final stage. Rub the sauce through a fine sieve which will produce the smooth velvety texture. You may not think this necessary if you have made the sauce carefully and it is quite free from lumps, but even then you will find it makes the difference.
Based on the Plain White Sauce recipe in:
Home Cookery Illustrated
by Anon (Odhams Press, Circa 1955).