White Roux Recipe

A White Roux is a common staple in the South. White Roux is a simple yet complex sauce. Our White Roux sauce is beautifully made by combining equal parts of fat, flour and adding a liquid of your choice, here we used Milk to make sawmill gravy. The sauce itself has many uses. Perhaps the most famous is a White or Sawmill gravy. The easiest method for making a simple white roux is by combining Butter, Flour and Milk. The introduction of other fats, like what we use, bacon grease, is an easy method for developing more flavor.

White Roux is actually commonly referred to as the paste itself made by the butter and flour. Once the Milk is added, then it formally becomes what some refer to as a Bechamel Sauce. There are three levels of Roux. The first level of the three is the White. The second is a brown, which requires just a little more cooking time. The last is a Dark roux. Brown or Dark roux is cooked until the flour darkens and is usually thinned with a broth to make it darker. Once the Roux paste is cooked for longer amounts of time, it becomes less efficient at thickening.

A white roux or blonde roux is simple and quick to make. It is often used in casseroles, macaroni and cheese and gravy. Once adding the milk to the roux, the roux works to thicken and become a beautiful sauce. From there, cheese or spices that are specific to what you are using it for, can be added.

Making the roux is far easier than people may think. I know lots of folks who think a cornstarch slurry is easier to make than a roux but in my opinion, it lacks flavor. A white roux is one more level of flavor that you can add to your cooking. I imagine a fine dish is made up of many layers of flavor. A well made white roux can do that for your cooking too. So here is how you make it!

• 2 Tablespoons Butter
• 2 Tablespoons Bacon Grease
• 4 Tablespoons of Flour
• 2 cups of Milk
• Salt and Pepper to taste

• Heat pan to Medium heat. In a cast iron skillet, melt Butter and Bacon grease . Sprinkle in flour and seasonings.
• Mix flour in to form a paste or a ball. Cook on medium heat for 1-3 minutes. The easiest way to tell when done is by smell. You will no longer be able to smell the flour smell.
• Slowly add in milk, stirring constantly. Turn the heat setting to low. Whisk to preferred thickness. Remove from heat.

**Note: For a darker roux, cook roux paste 5-11 minutes. Substitute Chicken or Beef broth for the milk.

There are many uses for a White Roux. While The Buttered Home's favorite is to add sausage and make it Sawmill gravy, we use this White Roux Recipe in a lot of our cooking.

Using the White Roux as a thickening base is very common. Soup is another favorite, if you take a look at the Steak and Potato Soup recipe, you will see, like most of our soups, it begins with a White Roux. It is a fantastic base for almost any cream based dish you will need. Alfredo sauce, Macaroni and Cheese are a couple more that come to mind.

Adding garlic, red pepper, onions and the like also transform this velvet confection into something different altogether. This recipe like so many of our others, is one that serves as a good base.

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