(no subject)

Made a veloute sauce last night, which makes four of five sauces. "Veloute" is the French name for the mother sauce, which is probably fancier than it really deserves. That shit is really just a kind of chicken gravy. It's stock and a roux, which you could just make by deglazing a pan. I guess that sounds dismissive? I know what it's for, but I wouldn't normally be making it specifically if I hadn't tasked myself specifically with making all five like some kind of video game trophy. The next - and last - sauce I have to make is the espagnole, which I'm not actually that fired up about. I had it in my head to make the brown stock, but I don't really want to. Roasting bones sounds tedious as fuck, and I don't exactly cook with a lot of beef, so it's not like I have any on hand.

So, I don't know. I don't like to do stuff halfway, so I don't think that beef broth cuts it. (On the other hand, epicurous seems to suggest that you can.) For the sake of my general sanity, I might just suck it up and buy the broth. Like, whatever, right?

Funny thing is that I'm probably not going to use any of these too much besides the old standby, the tomato. Maybe the Hollandaise? I could see using that. I can kind of get behind the idea that you can use a roux to thicken pretty much any watery bullshit sauce up, too. So, I guess the point is that I'm learning some basic cooking techniques. This shit seems to be the foundation of a lot of continental cuisines, so I'll probably be able to make some faux French dishes, and whatnot. I have to admit that I'm surprised that there's a good base of flavor in these sauces, but most of these are too rich for me to cook with on a daily basis - I think that using these sauces but not making the food too heavy, that's for cooks more experienced than I am yet!