Holiday gravy always seems to be the one thing we can never really get enough of at the table. Susan Volland, the author of Mastering Sauces: The Home Cook’s Guide to New Techniques for Fresh Flavors maintains that holiday gravy should always be made from scratch and served by the boatload.
Just in time for Thanksgiving, Susan shares with us her signature recipe for Holiday Gravy. It’s a traditional roux-thickened gravy made from pan drippings. Nothing flavors gravy like the savory, roasted bits and leftover, concentrated residue you find at the bottom of your roasting pan. You’ll want to liquefy those bits with a really great stock so that your gravy can best express those essential flavors of slow-cooked meat.
However, if meat is out of the question, roasted vegetables and a really good vegetable stock will also work. You can find Susan’s Savory Meatless (Vegan) Gravy recipe here.
Susan Volland’s Holiday Gravy
Yield: 2 cups
Ingredients
2 tbsps meat or root vegetable drippings and residue (from roasting pan)
2 tbsps all-purpose flour
2 cups Really Good Turkey/Chicken Stock, heated (recipe below)
OR 2 cups Brown Bone Stock, heated (recipe below)
Butter or vegetable oil, if needed
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Optional: Lemon juice, chopped fresh herbs, a few dashes of Tabasco and/or a dash of Worcestershire or fish sauce
Drain off all but 2 tablespoons of the drippings from your roasting pan. If there aren’t 2 tablespoons of drippings left, add butter or oil as necessary. Sprinkle flour into the roasting pan and stir until it combines with the drippings to form a thin, lump-free paste. There will be brown bits mixed into the roux, but these can be strained out later.
Place the roasting pan on a burner set to medium heat; if the pan is very large pan, use two burners. Cook the roux, stirring for about 2 to 3 minutes, or until it bubbles and turns golden brown. Do your best to gently soften and dissolve the brown bits into the fat and flour mixture to capture the flavors. Move the roasting pan around as the roux cooks to prevent it from cooking only in one spot.
Remove the pan from the heat. Pour in half of the stock and whisk it into the roux until smooth. Add the remaining stock and a pinch each of salt and pepper. Return the pan to the heat and simmer, whisking often, until the gravy has thickened and the raw taste of flour is completely gone, at least 5 minutes. If you want a sauce with a smoother, slightly richer texture and flavor, transfer the gravy to a saucepan, half-covered. Stir often and continue simmering until it reaches desired consistency.
Taste and season with additional salt and pepper. Strain if necessary. If desired, add a touch of lemon juice, herbs, Tabasco sauce, and/or an umami-rich sauce for freshness or savory depth. Serve warm.
If storing, cover and refrigerate for up to 4 days or freeze for up to 4 months.
Susan Volland’s Really Good Chicken Stock
Yield: About 8 cups
Chicken is perhaps the most familiar and universal of stocks. It is savory and flavorful but still quite neutral and lightly colored. Made from scratch, it has enough natural collagen to become viscous and syrupy when concentrated.
The best chicken stocks are made from stewing hens, which taste intensely of chicken. Farm-fresh stewing hens are mature birds that have lost all their tenderness. In Seattle, I can find small, wiry, tough-as-nails birds in the freezer section of Asian markets and sometimes Latin groceries. If stewing hens are not available, substitute chicken wings. The cartilage and connective tissues in the wings add more gelatin and body to stock than meatier pieces do. You can also use turkey wings to make Really Good Turkey Stock. Use a cleaver and poultry shears to cut through the bones.
I highly recommend using a pressure cooker for maximum flavor and infusion (see below for instructions).
Ingredients
About 10 cups cold water
2 small stewing hens
OR 2–3lbs (1–1.4kg) chicken wings, all pieces cut into 2″ (5cm) chunks
1 large yellow onion, cut into medium slices
1 carrot, peeled and cut into medium slices
1 stalk celery, sliced (optional)
1 bouquet garni (1 large fresh thyme sprig, 1 bay leaf, 3–4 sprigs bruised parsley)
5–7 black peppercorns
Pinch of kosher salt
½ cup white wine (optional)
To Prepare: Combine the chicken chunks, vegetables, bouquet garni, peppercorns, salt (and wine, if using) in a stockpot. Add enough cold water to cover everything by no more than 1″ (2½cm). Bring the water to a boil over high heat, then partially cover with a lid, reducing the heat, and cook at a trembling simmer for 1½ hours. You can poke down ingredients that bob up to the top now and then, but do not stir them, otherwise the stock will turn cloudy.
Set a large sieve or colander over a container. For clearer stock, line it with a few layers of dampened cheesecloth to catch smaller particulates. Carefully pour the stock through the strainer, without agitating the pieces too much. Stop pouring once the sediment runs. Strain the stock, without pressing on the solids. Discard the solids.
(Note: Putting pots of piping-hot stock in the refrigerator can raise the internal temperature to unsafe levels, so leave the stock out to cool before refrigerating.)
Storage: Cover and refrigerate for up to 5 days or freeze for up to 6 months.
Optional: If you have time, blanch the chicken pieces before starting. Place them in a pot with enough cold water to cover and bring to a boil over high heat. Drain, discarding the water, and proceed with the rest of the steps above. You may think this blanching step would drain off flavor, but it actually results in a clearer, more cleanly flavored end product.
***
Roasted Chicken and/or Turkey Stock
Yield: 6 to 7 cups
To Prepare: Preheat the oven to 400°F/205°C. Toss the chicken chunks and vegetables in vegetable oil and arrange them in two roasting pans or rimmed baking sheets. Roast, flipping the pieces every 10 to 15 minutes, until they turn an even dark brown, about 45 minutes. Transfer the chicken and vegetables to a stockpot. Deglaze the roasting pans with the wine, using the back of a spoon to gently dissolve the flavorful bits on the bottom of the pans. Add the deglazing liquid and the remaining ingredients to the stockpot and proceed. This yield will be reduced to 6 to 7 cups.
***
Pressure Cooker Chicken Stock
Halve the recipe and put the ingredients in a pressure cooker. Seal and cook according to manufacturer’s directions for 40 to 45 minutes.
Brown Bone Stock
Yield: 6 to 8 cups
Bones are used to make stock because connective tissues and cartilage are rich in collagen. Collagen makes gelatin, which adds body. Concentrated stocks that have lots of natural gelatin will reduce into the syrupy, gravy-like consistency so prized in meat sauces.
Traditionally veal knuckle bones are used, but they often need to be special ordered from a butcher, so I usually use beef bones. For a browner, more highly flavored stock, I add a few meaty, connective tissue–rich bones like neck bones, oxtails, shanks or ribs. It is best to use bones cut into 2-inch or 5-cm pieces, if your butcher is willing to cut them.
Adjust the initial roasting time as needed, depending on the bones you get. If you have bones of varied sizes, pull out the smaller pieces separately, once they become dark brown. You can also roast the vegetables, but I think that makes the final stock a bit too sweet.
Ingredients
About 1 gallon cold water
5 lbs (2.3kg) beef bones or veal knuckles, with a few meaty pieces of neck bones, beef shanks, oxtails or ribs thrown in for flavor
2 tbsps vegetable oil or light olive oil
1 tbsp tomato paste
½ cup red wine
1 large yellow onion, cut into 6 wedges or thickly sliced
1 large carrot, peeled and quartered or thickly sliced
2 stalks celery (optional), quartered
8 black peppercorns
1 bouquet garni (1 large fresh thyme sprig, 1 bay leaf, 3–4 sprigs bruised parsley)
Pinch of kosher salt
Preheat the oven to 425°F/215°C.
To Prepare: For a clear, clean-tasting stock, blanch the bones before you roast them. Place the bones in a stockpot and cover them with plenty of cold water. Bring just to a boil over high heat and drain, discarding the blanching water. Allow the bones to cool slightly.
Combine the oil and tomato paste in a small bowl. Place the bones in a large roasting pan and brush the tomato paste and olive oil mixture evenly over all the bones. Spread them out in the pan.
Roast the bones for 30 minutes. Turn the pieces over and continue roasting for another 15 to 20 minutes, until the meat, bones and cooking juices at the bottom of the pan turn dark brown but are not burnt.
Scoop the bones into a large stockpot. Pour off the fat from the roasting pan and add the wine to the hot roasting pan. Using a wooden spoon, gently loosen and dissolve the sticky brown juices into the wine. Pour the deglazing liquid into the stockpot. Add the remaining ingredients and just enough cold water to cover the ingredients completely.
Bring the water to a boil over high heat, then partially cover the pot with a lid, reducing the heat. Cook at a trembling simmer for 6 to 8 hours. You can poke down ingredients that bob up to the top now and then, but do not stir them, otherwise the stock will turn cloudy.
Set a large sieve or colander over a container. For clearer stock, line it with a few layers of dampened cheesecloth to catch smaller particulates. Carefully pour the stock through the strainer, without agitating the pieces too much. Stop pouring once the sediment runs. Strain the stock, without pressing on the solids. Discard the solids.
(Note: Putting pots of piping-hot stock in the refrigerator can raise the internal temperature to unsafe levels, so leave the stock out to cool before refrigerating.)
Storage: Cover and refrigerate for up to 5 days or freeze for up to 6 months.
(Note: After making the stock, there will still be plenty of collagen and gelatin left in the bones. If you like, return the bones to the empty stockpot and add fresh vegetables and water. Bring to a boil and simmer for 4 to 12 hours. Strain as above. This clearer, lighter stock is called a remouillage. It has plenty of gelatin, though not a lot of flavor.
***
Pressure-Cooker Brown Bone Stock
Halve the Brown Bone Stock recipe (see above). Put the roasted bones, deglazing liquid and the remaining ingredients into a pressure cooker. Seal and cook according to the manufacturer’s directions for 2 hours.
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