I come from a long line of people who can make really good white sauce and gravy from, well to be honest, it seemed like flour, milk and magic. There was never any measuring going on. It was a plop of this, spoon of that. It was just use the “fixin’s” or the left over grease, it is easy. My father made excellent sausage gravy (if a bit too spicy for me). My mom was the goddess of white sauce… creamed spinach, creamed beef on toast, creamed hard boiled egg on toast.
My own family? For years, they have gotten Thanksgiving gravy from a jar (with a bit of cut up turkey in to hopefully distract from the jar quality). Ok, I also even put it in a pan on the stove and hide the jar in the bottom of the trash.
One time I said to my mother, I would REALLY like for you to write down your White Sauce Recipe. It is very handy thing to know and I cannot make it. She eye rolled me and told me there isn’t a “recipe” ; you just put flour in and milk and let it come to boil. But how MUCH I would ask. And she would tell me, when it looks right, you know.
She then made me a recipe card… that she had copied out of the Betty Crocker cookbook. But also the following recipe card, that reads pretty much like she tried to explain to me a zillion times. It makes me smile to read it.
I have learned in just the last few years to make a white sauce (it is pretty much an adaptation of a Chicken Pot Pie recipe I have found) and she was right, once you make it enough… when it looks right, you know.
kkdonk 