Cherry tomatoes confit
In France during the Middle Ages, confit cooking was used to guarantee long-lasting preservation for some foods. This is very long, low-temperature cooking which causes...
31 July 2023
French cuisine is known worldwide for the number of sauces. Chef Escoffier mentions more than ninety different sauces. The sauces were originally intended to give flavor, to season, to mask foods not really of the highest quality or imperfect dishes. In the kitchen an important role in the brigade was that of the chef saucier who prepared sauces.
The basic sauces are: veloutè, béchamel, tomato sauce and gravy. From these, if combined with other ingredients, you will get other sauces such as the Mornay and the demi-glace.
This tradition was later imported into Italy and Luigi Carnacina, a roman gastronome, cites them in the book “The Carnacina: all secrets to eating well.”
The kitchen of my family in the 70s and 80s made extensive use of sauces. My great aunts used the bechamel a lot; my grandmother Irene used to make the cocktail sauce for the legendary shrimp cocktail, Mum made by hand with expertise the fresh mayonnaise for the Russian salad of which I’m very greedy; my grandmother Violetta remains undefeated for her tomato sauce with which she served divine dry pasta.
Below I report only the sauces most used in the family.