White gravy? Brown gravy?

[Toliver]

I never saw white gravy until I was on a vacation in Florida. That was the first I had heard of chicken fried steak. White gravy just doesn't look appetizing to me so I have never tried it. Out here in NM we don't do gravy - we have 'red or green'.

The white gravy that can come with chicken fried steak might not contain a drop of the rendered fat from the steak. A lot of restaurants use crumbled sausage and the rendered fat from the sausage as the base for their white gravy. Biscuits and gravy (a typical breakfast item around here) will have a sausage based white gravy.

I agree that white gravy can sometimes be heavy. You have to be in the mood for it and have to be able to remain motionless for a while after eating it.

edited for spellling

Edited October 27, 2009 by Toliver (log)

[Jenni]

I have to ask this - I've always been facinated by white gravy. What makes it gravy rather than just a white sauce? In the UK, gravy always seems to be brown, though I could be wrong, and white sauce is a different thing.

I think the main difference between a white sauce and a white gravy is that the white gravy usually uses drippings/rendered fat from the meat (or from another meat, for example, like sausage) and can be made in the same pan used to cook the meat entree. Of course, there are different ways to make the gravies but it supposed to be about economy and efficiency (why dirty another pan? Why throw out that chicken fat from the skillet when it can be used for gravy?).

Whereas a white sauce is usually made in a separate pan and normally doesn't use a rendered fat. Generally they use butter for the fat.

Of course, there are exceptions but I think this is the main difference between the two.

Ah, I see.

[Lilija]

This seems like the right time and place to bring this up. I'm staying well away from any debates or speculation, as there's room in my life for all gravies of every persuasion and color scale. (except brown gravies with blobs or chunks of solid matter floating within, like giblet or mushroom)

What I am curious about is a certain type of Georgia gravy. My step-grandparents always had a little glass pitcher of this gravy in the fridge. Gramma told me it was made with ketchup, and they called it "red-eye" gravy. It was a reddish dark brown, and very peppery, a little tangy and bitter, and extremely savory and meaty. She'd make it up by the pitcher, and keep it in the fridge, warming it in the microwave for every (and I mean EVERY) meal. I'm confused, though, because no recipe for red eye gravy that I've seen contained ketchup, and they made a big deal of that ingredient, because they loved the idea that I hated ketchup, and ate that stuff. So, is there some regional ketchupy red eye gravy from southern Georgia, or is this just a "weird grandparents" thing? Because I've been craving the stuff like crazy, and I'd like to recreate it, but it's difficult to do considering I haven't had it since I was 13.

[Doodad]

This seems like the right time and place to bring this up. I'm staying well away from any debates or speculation, as there's room in my life for all gravies of every persuasion and color scale. (except brown gravies with blobs or chunks of solid matter floating within, like giblet or mushroom)

What I am curious about is a certain type of Georgia gravy. My step-grandparents always had a little glass pitcher of this gravy in the fridge. Gramma told me it was made with ketchup, and they called it "red-eye" gravy. It was a reddish dark brown, and very peppery, a little tangy and bitter, and extremely savory and meaty. She'd make it up by the pitcher, and keep it in the fridge, warming it in the microwave for every (and I mean EVERY) meal. I'm confused, though, because no recipe for red eye gravy that I've seen contained ketchup, and they made a big deal of that ingredient, because they loved the idea that I hated ketchup, and ate that stuff. So, is there some regional ketchupy red eye gravy from southern Georgia, or is this just a "weird grandparents" thing? Because I've been craving the stuff like crazy, and I'd like to recreate it, but it's difficult to do considering I haven't had it since I was 13.

I am in GA and grew up in the South for the most part. I have never seen ketchup in the mix. Ham drippings, coffee and a little flour is how I make mine.

[CKatCook]

I hate to say this in a thread about gravy, but I hate gravy. Always have. Living in the south most my life where there is such a fuss made over biscuits and gravy, chicken fried steak, and stuff like that I could never get myself to eat it.

So I have to admire those that not only can make it, but like it.

[andiesenji]

This seems like the right time and place to bring this up. I'm staying well away from any debates or speculation, as there's room in my life for all gravies of every persuasion and color scale. (except brown gravies with blobs or chunks of solid matter floating within, like giblet or mushroom)

What I am curious about is a certain type of Georgia gravy. My step-grandparents always had a little glass pitcher of this gravy in the fridge. Gramma told me it was made with ketchup, and they called it "red-eye" gravy. It was a reddish dark brown, and very peppery, a little tangy and bitter, and extremely savory and meaty. She'd make it up by the pitcher, and keep it in the fridge, warming it in the microwave for every (and I mean EVERY) meal. I'm confused, though, because no recipe for red eye gravy that I've seen contained ketchup, and they made a big deal of that ingredient, because they loved the idea that I hated ketchup, and ate that stuff. So, is there some regional ketchupy red eye gravy from southern Georgia, or is this just a "weird grandparents" thing? Because I've been craving the stuff like crazy, and I'd like to recreate it, but it's difficult to do considering I haven't had it since I was 13.

Here is the quote from recipesource: http://www.recipesource.com/side-dishes/sauces/red-eye-gravy1.html

However, there is a "ketchup gravy" that is made with meat drippings, flour, water and ketchup and was a favored topping for meatloaf, hamburger "steak" and occasionally on open-face hot beef sandwiches in various cafés in certain areas of the lower midwest and south. I know it was served in Paducah, KY and in Nashville, TN because I have consumed it in both places. I also seem to recall it being on offer at a diner in Missouri.

I grew up in a family that doted on gravy and because there were so many of us, often there were multiple types on offer.

Ham gravy was almost always "red-eye" made with black coffee and lots of pepper.

Sausage called for a white(ish) gravy and chicken was always served with "milk" gravy. Game (and goose) was served with a brown gravy that had a bit of fruit added for "tang." And of course beef was served with beef gravy that was thinner than the other kinds. The turkey gravy was in a class by itself and I have never, ever been able to duplicate the flavor that I remember - my grandpa's cook never gave up the secret....

[kayb]

To this Southerner, the gravy/sauce/etc. divide is roughly this:

1. White gravy is made with the rendered fat of bacon or sausage, flour just cooked until it barely begins to turn color, and milk, salt and pepper to taste. It's served for breakfast, with biscuits, and one may use the bacon grease from the crock of it one keeps on one's stove (you don't do that? How do you cook?) to make said gravy for country fried steak, breaded pork chops, or fried chicken (or for the mashed potatoes that accompany those dishes).

2. Brown gravy is made from other meat drippings, flour cooked in until brown, and liquid which may be stock, water, wine or a combination of any of the above stirred in. It's served with all other meats except roast turkey.

3. Giblet gravy is made from the turkey drippings plus chicken stock, flour or cornstarch dissolved in water used to thicken, the cooked and diced giblets, and diced hard-boiled eggs, and eaten with turkey and cornbread dressing.

4. Red-eye gravy is made with the drippings from country ham, flour cooked to a dark roux, coffee and water stirred in. Must admit I have never heard of using any kind of tomato product in red-eye gravy.

5. The divide between brown gravy and a sauce is pretty thin. I guess I consider it a sauce when it has to be reduced to thicken, and a gravy when the flour serves as a thickener. Well, except for bechamel, but that's a white, and not a brown, sauce, and it's definitely not white gravy.

6. Spaghetti gravy is, I learned when I moved to Arkansas, a tomato-based pasta sauce with ground beef.