Melted Butter

Ingredients

• an ounce of butter
• three-quarters of an ounce of flour
• half a pint of water
• a little salt
• a little pepper
• a grate of nutmeg

Method

1. 1

   Melt the butter in a small saucepan, then stir in the flour until smooth.

2. 2

   Gradually add the cold water while stirring continuously until it boils.

3. 3

   Add salt, pepper, and nutmeg, and let it boil for three minutes.

4. 4

   For added richness, stir in cold butter just before serving without boiling.

As published

This recipe was extracted from The girl's own cookery book (1882) by Phillis Browne, page 64. The excerpt below is the record exactly as published.

half a pint of water would have made melted butter for twice the number of people, while three ounces of butter for the same measure of water would have been an ample allowance. Then as to the method of making that melted butter. Now, 1 can fancy some one saying, “Surely you are not going to tell us how to make melted buttter? We all know that.” If you do, I apologize ; but I beg to assure you that your knowledge is not universal. It is a very unusual thing to see well-made melted butter. It is our one English sauce, yet it is rarely properly prepared. One would think that there was no room for variety of procedure with simple ingredients like those required here ; yet I am merely stating a fact when I say that Sauces, and ITow to Make T]tem. 99 melted butter is seldom well-made. At the risk, therefore, of saying what may be regarded as unnecessary, I must ask to be allowed to describe how I should make melted butter, if I were asked to do so. I should take a small saucepan (not an iron one, for iron is not suited to the purpose), melt an ounce of butter in it, draw the pan to one side, and stir in three-quarters of an ounce of flour (remembering always that in making sauce we must take more butter than we do flour). I should beat the mi.xture with the back of a wooden spoon until it is quite smooth. Sauce with lumps in it is ob- jectionable, and now is the time to dispose of the lumps. I should then pour in, gradually, half a pint of cold water, stirring the sauce all the time, and keep stirring it till it boiled, add a little salt and pepper, or a grate of nutmeg if liked, let the sauce boil for three minutes, and it would be ready. The liquid should coat the spoon. Sauce thus made is fairly good as it is. It would, however, be very considerably improved if a little cold butter were stirred into it off the fire just before it was served. The quantity of butter thus added at the last moment might vary according to the degree of richness required. It must be remembered, however, that the sauce should not boil after the cold butter is added, and that it should be put in at the last minute. Many cooks break up the butter into small pieces in order to make it melt quickly. Melted butter is the basis of a great many sauces, and it is astonishing what variations may be introduced into it. A little lemon-juice or white wine vinegar may be added to it, or a tablespoonful of cream may be stirred in at the moment of serving. The addition of the yolk of one egg will convert it into sauce blanche — excellent for serving with cauliflower. If two or even three eggs are added with lemon-juice the sauce will be further improved. A dessertspoonful of washed and picked parsley, finely shred and thrown into melted butter, makes it intomaitre d’hotel sauce suitable for boiled mutton or new potatoes boiled. Or chopped fennel, blanched and chopped tarragon, picked shrimps, anchovy essence, bruised capers, onion pulp, chopped onion, hard-boiled eggs, or gherkins finely minced, may be stirred in, and the melted 100 The Girl's Own Cookery Book. butter will thus be converted into fennel, tarragon, shrimp, anchovy, caper, onion, egg, or a variety oi piquante sauce. The addition of sugar, treacle, wine, or brandy will make it into sauce suitable for puddings. It must always be remembered that egg-yolk, cream, and chopped parsley, should not boil in the sauce, they should be stirred in at the last moment ; also that white onion sauce should be made with milk instead of water. In brown onion sauce the onions are browned before being used. When sauce is to be served with meat or fish, stock made of the trimmings should be substituted for the water. When it is practicable, it is always desirable to use even weak stock instead of water, because it contains more nourishment. Of course, brown stock is taken for brown sauces, and white stock for white sauces. When stock is used, it should be added very gradually. If hot stock were thrown in all at once, the sauce would be lumpy. Skim milk is frequently used instead of white stock in making white sauce, for economy’s sake. For the same reason — economy — dripping is occasion- ally used instead of butter in making sauce. If anyone feels inclined to look scornful on hearing this, I should like to remark that for every culinary purpose good dripping is to be preferred to bad butter. You may make excellent sauce with pure dripping ; it is not possible to make sauce that will even pass muster with rancid butter. A smaller quantity of dripping than butter should be used however, or the flavour of the sauce will not be good. Excellent fish sauce may be made by adding lemon-juice, parsley, and cream to melted butter. When cream is used, less butter is needed. Brown sauce and white sauce are very favourite pre- parations, suited for a variety of dishes. Brown sauce may be made as follows : — Peel a shalot, or small onion, scrape half a moderate-sized carrot, remove the dark skin and dark stalk from three mushrooms ; chop all finely hlelt an ounce of butter in a saucepan, sprinkle an ounce of flour into it, and beat it to prevent it forming into lumps. Pour in gradually half a pint of brown stock, stirring all the time ; then add the vegetables, a bay leaf, and a sprig of thyme. Draw the pan back, and let the sauce simmer for twenty minutes. Add pepper and salt, Sauces, and How to Make Them. loi and two tablespoonfuls of Harvey’s sauce ; strain and serve. If the vegetables are allowed to “ sweat ” in butter — that is, fry gently without discolouring — they will yield their flavour better. The flavour of this brown sauce may be varied in ac- cordance with not only the taste of the maker, but the contents of the store-closet, care being taken always to make it suited to the meat it is to accompany. Thus, a little celery may be substituted for the mushrooms, and a slice of turnip may be added, or lemon-peel, parsley, or a bunch of sweet herbs may be introduced. A slice of lean ham is a valuable flavouring ingredient. Some cooks think that good brown sauce cannot be made without ham ; and there is a story told of a cook who, having to prepare a little supper

Cook this with the app: pantry check, scaling, and the assistant.