Traditional English Parsley Sauce...

Feeling confident after my triumph with a basic beurre blanc sauce, I decided to try my hand at a traditional English parsley sauce. This is a tasty sauce to have with white fish or salmon cakes and we enjoyed it very much with some smoked gammon. Essentially it’s a basic white sauce with the addition of freshly chopped parsley. When researching recipes I found that many didn’t include a squeeze of fresh lemon juice but it really gives the sauce added zing. I wouldn’t make the sauce without it now!

There is nothing quite like going out to the garden to gather fresh herbs to cook with. Parsley grows quite easily and makes a lovely addition to any garden. If you don’t already grow your own herbs then it’s definitely worth giving it a go! Check out this site for some amazing gardening tips.

Parsley, one of my all time favourite herbs is full of taste and great health benefits. Among other things it has Vitamin C, Iron and is also an excellent source of Vitamin K, Vitamin A and Folate. Try adding it to salads, burgers, omelettes, fresh juices and soups. You can even sprinkle it on pasta and rice dishes as well as over pretty much anything!

So if you want something special to accompany your fish dish or gammon then look no further! This parsley sauce from the Good To Know Recipes website is a real winner!

Here is the recipe from their brilliant site:

Parsley Sauce

Ingredients

• 425ml full fat milk

• Bunch of flat leaf parsley finely chopped (but keep the stalks)

• 1 bay leaf

• 1/4 onion, thickly sliced

• 5 peppercorns

• Pinch of nutmeg

• 20g plain flour

• 40g butter

• Squeeze of lemon juice

• Salt and pepper to season

Directions

1. Put the milk, parsley stalks, bay leaf, onion, peppercorns and nutmeg in a heavy-bottomed pan.

2. Bring to the boil over a medium heat, then remove from the heat and allow to go cold. This will help to infuse the milk before making the sauce.

3. Slowly melt the butter in another saucepan. Add the flour and stir continuously for a minute so that you cook out the raw flour flavour. Remove from the heat.

4. Strain the milk through a sieve to remove the infusing ingredients and slowly add the milk to the butter and flour mixture. Keep combining a little more milk every few seconds until you’ve added it all. You should now have a thin, lump-free sauce.

5. Return the pan to the heat and stir the sauce until it starts to thicken. This will take about 5 minutes.

6. Once it’s thick, remove from the heat. Add the chopped parsley, lemon juice, salt and pepper.

7. Serve your parsley sauce with salty roast gammon and new potatoes, crispy fishcakes or grilled white fish.

Enjoy!

Parsley Sauce

Pan Fried Scallops with a Basic Beurre Blanc Sauce...

I won’t deny that sauces scare me. You have to get the flavour and texture just right and your timing must be perfect. To me they have always seemed fiddly, labour intensive and far too easy to screw up. My question has always been – is it really worth it to make a sauce?

Well for a long time I didn’t think so. A few years back I did attempt a Hollandaise to go with some beautiful fresh asparagus. The result was a nasty curdled mess alongside charred asparagus (charred because I was so busy with the sauce I completely forgot about it).

So what are some of the things that go wrong with sauces?

• They can split, burn or curdle

• Be too watery, thick or lumpy

• Not have enough flavour OR have too much flavour and completely over power everything else on the plate

Of course when done correctly sauces have the ability to take dishes to a whole new level.

• They enhance the flavour of particular ingredient(s)

• They give added depth of flavour and marry ingredients together bringing harmony and balance to a dish

• They also add extra colour, aroma, texture and moisture

There are many different varieties of sauces but they all stem from what is known as the 5 Mother Sauces.

So what are the 5 mother sauces?

• Béchamel (white sauce made with milk, butter and flour)

• Velouté (similar to Béchamel but made with stock instead of milk)

• Espagnole (a rich brown sauce made with meat stock and root vegetables)

• Hollandaise (a rich sauce made from eggs, butter and lemon juice)

• As for the 5th sauce, some books mention Vinaigrette (a combination of oil and vinegar) while others mention Tomato based (or red) sauces.

Now there are some sauces I do feel confident in making and tomato or red sauce is one of them. I can also rustle up fairly decent vinaigrette when in the mood. However I am terrified of anything involving ingredients like eggs, butter, milk, vinegar or wine which requires vigorous continual whisking and vigilant temperature control. It all just seems…. too much.

Well the other week while watching Masterchef: The Professionals I was intrigued to see them prepare pan fried scallops with a classic Beurre Blanc sauce. The recipe really stuck in my mind and I felt this weekend it was time to face my ‘sauce’ fears and make this dish.

My husband seasoned the scallops (we had 3 each) with some salt and a pinch of cayenne pepper. While he was searing them in the pan I was madly whisking a combination of shallots, bay leaves, peppercorns, white wine, white wine vinegar, thick cream and butter (a lot of butter!). I did my best to taste as I went along while making sure it didn’t burn. There were a few scary moments but it all went according to plan and the end result was pretty amazing! It was much easier then I thought it would be (despite the crazy whisking and intense temperature monitoring) and it worked beautifully with the scallops.

So if you were like me and afraid of sauces – don’t be. I know that the more I practice the easier it will become. It will also help take my cooking in a whole new direction which I am excited about.
Here is the recipe I used for a Basic Beurre Blanc sauce. It has been shared by Jay from the All Recipes website. It is a real winner and can be used with pan fried scallops, delicately poached fish or grilled vegetables. The only thing I added was a wee bit of freshly chopped parsley at the end.

Enjoy.

Jay’s Basic Beurre Blanc Sauce

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 tablespoons chopped shallot

• 1 bay leaf

• 6 black peppercorns

• 1/4 cup white wine vinegar

• 2 tablespoons dry white wine

• 1/4 cup heavy cream

• 1 1/2 cups cold butter, cut into 1/2 inch pieces

Directions

1. Place shallot, bay leaf, peppercorns, vinegar, and wine in a saucepan. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium and continue simmering until only 2 tablespoons of liquid remain.

2. Pour in heavy cream and bring to a simmer; simmer until the cream has reduced by half. Increase heat to medium-high, and rapidly whisk in the butter, piece, by piece until it has melted into the cream and thickened it. Strain the sauce through a mesh strainer to remove the spices. Serve immediately.

Scallops with a Beurre Blanc Sauce