Béchamel
One of the French mother sauces — a pale roux of butter and flour loosened with warm milk into something glossy and velvet-smooth, whispered with nutmeg and white pepper. The blank canvas behind a thousand gratins.
Ingredients
For 4 servings · tick what is ready
Use the scaled ingredient list. Steps and temperatures stay unchanged; use a larger pan or dish if needed. Seasonings to taste stay to taste.
How to make it
Melt the butter over medium-low heat until it foams but does not brown. Whisk in the flour all at once and cook, stirring constantly, for 2-3 minutes. The goal is to cook out the raw-flour taste while keeping the roux pale — a white roux, not blond. Do not let it color.
Pour in the warm milk in a thin stream, whisking hard and constantly. Add the first third slowly to let the roux absorb it into a thick paste, then stream in the rest. Whisking through each addition is what keeps the sauce smooth — milk added all at once makes lumps.
Bring to a bare simmer over medium-low heat, whisking often and scraping the corners of the pan. Cook 8-10 minutes until it thickens to nappe consistency — thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. A skin will try to form; keep it moving.
Off the heat, season with salt, a careful grating of nutmeg, and white pepper. Taste and adjust — béchamel should taste of seasoned cream, the nutmeg present but unnameable. If using an onion piqué, fish it out now. Press plastic wrap to the surface if holding.
About this recipe
By ForkRecipe Kitchen · Source: ForkRecipe / FoodML and contributors. Recipe content available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Serving count is an estimate; check quantities in the source recipe.