Thickening Brown Sauces

[paulraphael]

I'm revisiting methods for sauces, stocks and glaces, and am assuming there are better thickeners available than what my current habits dictate.

 

Long ago I abandoned roux and heavily-reduced gelatinous stock for milder reductions thickened with xanthan gum and arrowroot. The three thickeners involved (natural gelatin, a gum, and a starch) each have their shortcomings but when used together give a nice synergy.

 

But now I'm thinking the starch element is probably obsolete. There must be a gum or other colloid that will mask flavors even less than arrowroot and bring other advantages. 

 

Has anyone used methylcellulose for this? I like the idea of something that will work in opposition to the gelatin's tendency to thicken upon cooling. I'm wondering if a combination of gelatin, xanthan, and methylcellulose could give a nice, creamy/syruppy texture with a fairly temperature-independent viscocity.

 

Any other ideas?

[gfweb]

Xanthan gum works well for me when I use it in brown sauces. For no particular reason I tend to use it in cold sauces eg pulled pork sauce or salad dressing.

 

I prefer Wondra for brown sauce/gravy. No fat...can be done at the last minute...has the right look. 

 

For clear sauces, corn starch works well for me, but I don't mind the Chinese restaurant look(most of the time).

[Chris Hennes]

It had never occurred to me to try to achieve a similar viscosity and high and low temperatures, it's a really interesting thought. I have not used methylcellulose, but carrageenan can be used to thicken both hot and cold liquids and can be combined with locust bean gum and/or xanthan gum: maybe you could find your texture there? I've found the flavor release excellent when using carrageenan and xanthan.

[paulraphael]

Chris, what kind of carrageenan have you used? I have some kappa here but haven't tried it in this kind of application. I don't want something that will form a gell with the xanthan.

 

From what I'm reading, lambda carrageenan seems like a good bet for sauces. It also seems like the least common type.

Edited April 28, 2014 by paulraphael (log)

[Paul Bacino]

You could dcarch's pressure cooker-- no water stock.

 

I would say the finished result was more of a sauce/gravy then stock.

 

Here!!

 

May  I suggest you to give this a try just for fun?

 

First - pressure cook without any water, that's right, NO WATER. You will get a 1/2 cup to a cup of pure pure concentrated liquid gold. Save this for special uses.

 

Second - Then add water to make your regular stock. 

 

Third - Use the leftovers from the second step, use much less water and PC the third time. You will get some stock with not much taste, Use it for the second step the next time you make stock. Don't bother with this step if you think it's too much trouble.

 

dcarch

Made the no water stock this weekend--I have a 6 Qt KR

 

I had two left-over Costco chicken Carasses,  added the usual stuff .

 

Sometimes I will do an extra roast of all the stuff. This was a trial run. So I just put it all in the pot.

 

Sealed, ran the pot, 45Mins @15 psi--now I jiggled the pot occasionally,  just at first --worried that i might get some early burning of the bones,  w/o water--- I didnt do a full blast fire burn either.  Cooled and strained

 

Yep.. got about 1/2 C--Immediatley on draining of the juice it..almost instantly congealed.  It tasted like a killer gravy w/o adding flour.  Really coated the lips too.

 

I did a second stock also..  Since all the bones had kinda broke up..I added about a pint of water or half way up the bone mass.  I didnt add any additioanl veg.

 

Man the turned out pretty good..one thing I noticed is the deep righer color I got in the second batch.

 

Pretty cool--I'm going to add that to my next batch of regular stock

 

Thanks

 

I used a bit of the first batch  - with my morel cream sauce

 

[paulraphael]

That's an interesting method, and it makes sense. I'd call it "no water added" since it's all about extraction.

 

But I'm still looking for the ability to adjust texture and thickness, sometimes in finished sauces that may or not be based on that method.

[Chris Hennes]

From what I'm reading, lambda carrageenan seems like a good bet for sauces. It also seems like the least common type.

 

Right, lambda is what I'm suggesting, though I haven't actually tried to do what you are suggesting, so it's just an idea.

[paulraphael]

Has anyone played with propylene glycol alginate?

[Martin Fisher]

....a nice, creamy/syrupy texture with a fairly temperature-independent viscosity.

 

Have you considered fluid gels?

 

See Chris Young's comment (5th post) in the following thread......

http://forum.chefsteps.com/discussion/401/thickening-sauces-especially-gravy-without-starch

[paulraphael]

Fluid gels sound intriguing. I wouldn't be surprised if you could get exactly teh results I'm looking for. I don't like the working method, though. Lots of steps, and not easy to make adjustments as you go.

[ChrisZ]

I can't remember which recipe, I think it was one of Heston Blumenthal's, but the sauce was set with agar and then blended.  It worked perfectly and I was pretty surprised!  I can't comment on flavour release as compared to other thickeners, but where I live agar is easier to get than any of the other, modern thickeners such as gellans or carrageenans.

[paulraphael]

My first round of experiments with water and boxed stock were promising. Starting with stock enriched with 2% gelatin, I got a good, creamy texture with 0.2% lambda carrageenen (TIC gums Ticacell 750) and 0.1% xanthan gum (Bob's Red Mill from supermarket). 

 

These are cold-soluble with a stick blender, and have good clarity and excellent flavor release. And they're heat stable. The xanthan gives a bit of that jiggly cling. I may try dropping it down to 0.07%, but will have to try in a real jus / coulis first.

 

For last-minute sauce thickening, I tried whisking in a 1.5 : 1 mix of arrowroot and lambda carrageenan. In the past I've used 5 :1 arrowroot and xanthan. The carrageenan gives a slightly nicer texture, but is harder to get into solution without lumps It's synergistic with starches, so you can use less starch. The downside is there's less starch to keep the gum from clumping. The upside is better flavor release.

 

For the first time ever I sampled pure water thickened with these colloids. While I wasn't tempted to go back for seconds, I was pleased that there were no bad flavors, and barely any detectable flavor at all.

[KennethT]

I know you wanted to avoid the starch route, but another option is Ultra-Tex 8. It's a cold swelling starch derived from tapioca, and a little tiny bit goes a long way, so it doesn't mask flavors. It yields a very nice creamy mouthfeel.