Béchamel sauce
Encyclopedia
French cuisine
French cuisine is a style of food preparation originating from France that has developed from centuries of social change. In the Middle Ages, Guillaume Tirel , a court chef, authored Le Viandier, one of the earliest recipe collections of Medieval France...
and is used in many recipes of Italian cuisine
Italian cuisine
Italian cuisine has developed through centuries of social and political changes, with roots as far back as the 4th century BCE. Italian cuisine in itself takes heavy influences, including Etruscan, ancient Greek, ancient Roman, Byzantine, Jewish and Arab cuisines...
, for example lasagne. It is used as the base for other sauces (such as Mornay sauce
Mornay sauce
A Mornay sauce is a Béchamel sauce with shredded or grated cheese added. Usually, it consists of half Gruyère and half Parmesan cheese, though some variations use different combinations of Gruyère, Emmental cheese, or white Cheddar....
, which is Béchamel with cheese
Cheese
Cheese is a generic term for a diverse group of milk-based food products. Cheese is produced throughout the world in wide-ranging flavors, textures, and forms....
). It is traditionally made by whisk
Whisk
A whisk is a cooking utensil used in food preparation to blend ingredients smooth, or to incorporate air into a mixture, in a process known as whisking or whipping. Most whisks consist of a long, narrow handle with a series of wire loops joined at the end. The wires are usually metal, but some are...
ing scalded milk
Scalded milk
Scalded milk is milk that has been heated to . At this temperature, bacteria and enzymes in the milk are destroyed. Since most milk sold today is pasteurized, which accomplishes both of these goals, milk is typically scalded simply to increase its temperature, or to change the consistency due to...
gradually into a white roux
Roux
Roux is a cooked mixture of wheat flour and fat, traditionally butter. It is the thickening agent of three of the mother sauces of classical French cooking: sauce béchamel, sauce velouté and sauce espagnole. Clarified butter, vegetable oils, or lard are commonly used fats. It is used as a...
(equal parts butter
Butter
Butter is a dairy product made by churning fresh or fermented cream or milk. It is generally used as a spread and a condiment, as well as in cooking applications, such as baking, sauce making, and pan frying...
and flour by weight). Another method, considered less traditional, is to whisk kneaded flour-butter (beurre manié
Beurre manié
Beurre manié is a dough, consisting of equal parts of soft butter and flour, used to thicken soups and sauces. By kneading the flour and butter together, the flour particles are coated in butter...
) into scalded milk. The thickness of the final sauce depends on the proportions of milk and flour.
Origin
Béchamel is an improvement upon a similar, earlier sauce, the TuscanTuscany
Tuscany is a region in Italy. It has an area of about 23,000 square kilometres and a population of about 3.75 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence ....
"salsa colla", imported from Italy to France by Catherine de' Medici
Catherine de' Medici
Catherine de' Medici was an Italian noblewoman who was Queen consort of France from 1547 until 1559, as the wife of King Henry II of France....
. http://lukehoney.typepad.com/the_greasy_spoon/2010/03/bechamel-sauce.html.
According to Larousse Gastronomique
Larousse Gastronomique
Larousse Gastronomique is an encyclopedia of gastronomy. The majority of the book is about French cuisine, and contains recipes for French dishes and cooking techniques...
, the sauce is named after the "marquis de Béchamel", actually Louis de Béchameil, marquis de Nointel
Louis de Bechamel
Louis de Béchameil, marquis de Nointel was a French financier and patron of the arts.-Life:Son of patrick-Baptiste Béchameil, Louis was a rich tax farmer and superintendent to the house of the Duke of Orléans; he was intendant of Brittany and of the généralité of Tours...
(1630–1703). According to Larousse the sauce is an improvement upon a similar, earlier sauce, known as velouté
Velouté sauce
A velouté sauce, pronounced , along with Allemande, Béchamel, and Espagnole, is one of the sauces of French cuisine that were designated the four "mother sauces" by Antonin Carême in the 19th century. The French chef Auguste Escoffier later classified tomato, mayonnaise, and Hollandaise mother...
. Béchameil was a financier who held the honorary post of chief steward to Louis XIV. The sauce under its familiar name first appeared in Le Cuisinier François, (published in 1651), by François Pierre La Varenne
François Pierre La Varenne
François Pierre de la Varenne , Burgundian by birth, was the author of Le Cuisinier françois , the founding text of modern French cuisine. La Varenne broke with the Italian traditions that had revolutionized medieval French cookery in the 16th century...
(1615–1678), chef de cuisine to Nicolas Chalon du Blé, marquis d'Uxelles. The foundation of French cuisine, the Cuisinier François
François Pierre La Varenne
François Pierre de la Varenne , Burgundian by birth, was the author of Le Cuisinier françois , the founding text of modern French cuisine. La Varenne broke with the Italian traditions that had revolutionized medieval French cookery in the 16th century...
ran through some thirty editions in seventy-five years.
The sauce originally was a veal velouté
Velouté sauce
A velouté sauce, pronounced , along with Allemande, Béchamel, and Espagnole, is one of the sauces of French cuisine that were designated the four "mother sauces" by Antonin Carême in the 19th century. The French chef Auguste Escoffier later classified tomato, mayonnaise, and Hollandaise mother...
with a large amount of cream added.
Many chefs would now regard as authoritative the recipe of Auguste Escoffier
Auguste Escoffier
Georges Auguste Escoffier was a French chef, restaurateur and culinary writer who popularized and updated traditional French cooking methods. He is a legendary figure among chefs and gourmands, and was one of the most important leaders in the development of modern French cuisine...
presented in Saulnier's Répertoire
Le Répertoire de la Cuisine
Le Répertoire de La Cuisine by Louis Saulnier, is a reference book available in the original French and in English translations. Several editions are in circulation, such as the Canterbury Press translation of 1961, or the Barron's Educational Series edition of 1976...
: "White roux
Roux
Roux is a cooked mixture of wheat flour and fat, traditionally butter. It is the thickening agent of three of the mother sauces of classical French cooking: sauce béchamel, sauce velouté and sauce espagnole. Clarified butter, vegetable oils, or lard are commonly used fats. It is used as a...
moistened with milk, salt, onion stuck with clove
Clove
Cloves are the aromatic dried flower buds of a tree in the family Myrtaceae. Cloves are native to the Maluku islands in Indonesia and used as a spice in cuisines all over the world...
, cook for 20 minutes".
Sauces
Béchamel sauce is the base for a number of other classic sauces with additional ingredients added including:- Mornay sauceMornay sauceA Mornay sauce is a Béchamel sauce with shredded or grated cheese added. Usually, it consists of half Gruyère and half Parmesan cheese, though some variations use different combinations of Gruyère, Emmental cheese, or white Cheddar....
(cheese) - Nantua sauceNantua sauceNantua sauce is a classical French sauce consisting of:*a Béchamel sauce base*cream*crayfish butter*crayfish tailsThe term à la Nantua may be used in classical French cuisine to refer to any dish containing crayfish....
(crayfishCrayfishCrayfish, crawfish, or crawdads – members of the superfamilies Astacoidea and Parastacoidea – are freshwater crustaceans resembling small lobsters, to which they are related...
, butter and cream) - Crème sauce (heavy creamHeavy CreamHeavy Cream is a compilation album of music recorded by Cream during 1966-68.Although available in other territories as well, the album was largely released to address the North American market, in order for Polydor Records to leverage Cream's back catalog; prior to 1972, Polydor had licensed...
) - Mustard sauce (prepared mustard seedMustard seedMustard seeds are the small round seeds of various mustard plants. The seeds are usually about 1 or 2 mm in diameter. Mustard seeds may be colored from yellowish white to black. They are important spices in many regional foods. The seeds can come from three different plants: black mustard , brown...
) - SoubiseSoubiseSoubise can refer to:* Soubise sauce, a béchamel-based sauce containing strained or puréed onions* Soubise, a commune of the Charente-Maritime département, in France* Benjamin de Rohan, duc de Soubise , Huguenot leader...
sauce (finely diced onionOnionThe onion , also known as the bulb onion, common onion and garden onion, is the most widely cultivated species of the genus Allium. The genus Allium also contains a number of other species variously referred to as onions and cultivated for food, such as the Japanese bunching onion The onion...
s that have been sweated in butter) - Cheddar cheese sauce (Cheddar cheeseCheddar cheeseCheddar cheese is a relatively hard, yellow to off-white, and sometimes sharp-tasting cheese, produced in several countries around the world. It has its origins in the English village of Cheddar in Somerset....
, dry mustard, Worcestershire sauceWorcestershire sauceWorcestershire sauce , or Worcester sauce is a fermented liquid condiment; primarily used to flavour meat or fish dishes.First made at 60 Broad Street, Worcester, England, by two dispensing chemists, John Wheeley Lea and William Henry Perrins, the Lea & Perrins brand was commercialised in 1837 and...
)
The term "white sauce" or sauce blanche may also be applied to a simple sauce consisting only of milk and melted butter, without flour or spices.
Dishes
Dishes made with béchamel sauce include:- Croque Monsieur (some variations)
- A very thick bechamel sauce is used to create the topping of a ParmoParmoParmo or Parmesan, a food dish originating in Middlesbrough, is popular in the North East of England, North Yorkshire and especially in the Teesside area, Hartlepool and Darlington. It typically consists of deep-fried chicken in bread crumbs topped with a white béchamel sauce and cheese...
- MoussakaMoussakaMoussaka is an eggplant based dish of the Balkans, Eastern Mediterranean, and the Middle East. The best known variation outside the region is the Greek one.-Names and etymology:...
, a layered dish found in Greece and throughout the Balkans and Middle East
Brandy sauce is a sweetened béchamel flavoured with rum, brandy or spices, and is a traditional accompaniment to Christmas Pudding
Christmas pudding
Christmas pudding is a pudding traditionally served on Christmas Day . It has its origins in medieval England, and is sometimes known as plum pudding or plum duff, though this can also refer to other kinds of boiled pudding involving dried fruit.-Basics:Many households have their own recipe for...
.
External links
- History and legends of Béchamel sauce
- "Balsamella" (Béchamel) white sauce, step-by-step instruction
- Free Culinary School Podcast Episode 10 An educational podcast episode that talks about the classical French technique used for making Sauce Béchamel and a few secondary sauces including Mornay, Basic Cream, Cheddar Cheese and Mustard Sauce.