Kitchen Bouquet - whattaya think of it?

[Starkman]

In looking through a few older cookbooks I have, I've noticed a reasonable amount of usage of Kitchen Bouquet.

Well, a search of the forums brought up some hits, but nothing specific about current thought in using Kitchen Bouquet.

What's everybody's opinion?

Does it, in fact, add flavor, or is it namely for color?

Is there a better product, or do certain cooking methods and techniques suffice to aquire the same results?

Thanks,

Starkman

[Domestic Goddess]

My hubby uses it for his Beef Vegetable soup and stews. He says that it does add a great color to the soup and stew, the flavor change is minimal. I have read that it is primarily a browning and seasoning sauce. It can be used as a gravy base.

It is also used by food stylists for a variety of appearance effects, including 'coffee' made by adding a few drops of Kitchen Bouquet to a cup of water and lending a browned appearance to poultry. - Wiki entry

I have had the mistake of accidentally dumping half a bottle of the stuff in a one-pot stew I was making and the sauce became acrid and bitter.

[annabelle]

I use it some times in brown sauces. A little, say a teaspoonful, goes a long way and doesn't change the flavor of a flour thickened sauce appreciably.

[mgaretz]

Kitchen Bouquet is primarily caramel coloring with some vegetable stock. Most of time you can just substitute caramel coloring.

Caramel coloring is much, much cheaper than Kitchen Bouquet - you can get it at Smart and Final or at a restaurant supply store.

[BarbaraY]

I have used it in the past but no longer find any need for it. Mostly used to give a brown color to gravies.

My late DH called it "Kitchen Bucket".

[zeffer81]

Am I dating myself by saying I didn't even know what this was?