A world famous chef has advised women to be daring and experiment with herbs and other seasonings. Better yet, you can have a wonderful time trying sauces others have found add to the enjoyment of desserts, vegetables, and meats. In these pages we have tried to give you a wide variety of the best known tried and true sauces. We know you will have fun serving them…and that your family will be very proud of your new skill. ~ Betty Crocker, p. 353, The Picture Cookbook
The other day I posted my grandmother’s tuna noodle casserole recipe. Like many recipes, it calls for a can of cream of mushroom soup. It seems like those cream of ____ soups have become ubiquitous with casseroles or any dish that needs thickening. I’ve certainly used my share of them over the years. But I’ve noticed that most of the mid-century recipes actually incorporate a white sauce into the recipe instead of the cream of whatever soup. White sauce is also the foundation for many gravies.
As a teenager, my gravy was pretty awful. It was pasty and lumpy. I never thought to look in my mother’s Picture Cookbook for a recipe for gravy (it’s on page 356 of my edition)! One day I discovered that the box of cornstarch had recipes for gravy AND for white sauce. I used the cornstarch method for the next 20+ years. But, as I delved deeper and deeper into vintage cooking, I finally had to face the day that I was going to have to learn how to make a white sauce using flour. I looked it up in the Picture Cookbook and it came out beautifully! It only seems intimidating!
Ingredients for White Sauce
Thin Sauce
1 Tbsp. butter 1 Tbsp. flour 1/4 tsp. salt 1/8 tsp. pepper 1 cup milkMedium Sauce 2 to 3 Tbsp. butter 2 to 3 Tbsp. flour 1/4 tsp. salt 1/8 tsp. pepper 1 cup milk
Thick Sauce 4 Tbsp. butter 4 Tbsp. salt 1/4 tsp. salt 1/8 tsp. pepper 1 cup milk
If you notice, the ONLY thing that changes is the amount of butter and flour you use. And the butter and flour amounts are always equal–so if you want your sauce even thicker than what the ratio above gives you (and it is pretty thick), you would add equal amounts of butter and flour.
I’ve included a video that shows the basic steps in how to make the white sauce. You’ll see that it is pretty straightforward. The only difference between what Betty recommends and the video is that she removes the pan from heat while blending in the milk before returning to the heat. I found by doing that step, it prevents the sauce from starting to thicken too quickly (prevents the lumps). Betty and I also use a wooden spoon instead of a whisk. It’s up to your own preference.
I prefer the flavor of the white sauce made with flour over that made with cornstarch. Learn to make this sauce and you will have a powerful recipe in your cooking toolkit.
I didn’t take home ec in high school, but my mother did. She said white sauce was the first cooking skill she was taught, and it’s the first skill she taught me. Removing the pan from the heat to stir in the flour and milk was essential. The other essential from beginning to end was never to leave it unattended, stirring constantly — also true of gravy making or any flour / fat-based sauce. I have also used creamed soup a lot as a base and now we can buy it with less fat, but if I see that a white sauce would work just as well, that’s what I try to do.