Reduction Sauces
from http://www.reluctantgourmet.com/

Before Reduction Sauces

Before everyone was concerned about diets and eating healthier, most sauces were thickened with the help of liaisons, a fancy name for thickening agents. The most popular is a classic roux consisting of a fat (usually butter) and flour although some people will use simple flour and water. Béchamel Sauce (White Sauce) is an example of a sauce thickened with butter and flour. Gravy that is served with beef roasts and roasted poultry such as turkey for Thanksgiving is thickened with flour added to the meat fats and juices that form on the bottom of the pan and is another example.

Another popular thickener is cornstarch mixed with a little water or stock.

Egg yolks are also used to create a silky texture but if you’re not careful, they can end up as scrambled eggs. Hollandaise Sauce and Sauce Béarnaise are examples of sauces thickened with egg yolks.

Another favorite thickening agent is cream or half and half (half milk/half cream).

Reduction Sauces

With restaurant goers demanding lower calorie and less fat in their food but still wanting it to taste special, chefs turned to reduction sauces to give them what they want. A reduction is the result of boiling or cooking down a liquid until it reduces to the consistency of a sauce. The liquid can be just about anything but is usually a wine or a stock that has been used to deglaze a pan where meat, chicken or fish have just been sautéed.

What’s great about reduction sauces is they are easy to prepare at home and because you are evaporating the water from whatever liquid you are using, you are instantly intensifying the overall flavor of the sauce.

Fond

Restaurants chefs use this technique all the time. They cook a protein like meat or fish, in a sauté pan over pretty high heat until it's done and this leaves a bunch of brown caramelized bits of "stuff" in the pan.

The "stuff" has a name, it's called "fond" and you want that "fond" stuck to your saute pan because it is packed with incredible flavors. It's also easy to remove by adding a little liquid to the pan and using a wooden spoon to dissolve it. This is called deglazing and can be done with wine, brandy, fortified wines, stock, cider, fruit juices or most typically a combination of two. Just be careful if you use wine, to remove the pan from the heat so the alcohol doesn't ignite and blow up in your face. I've spoken with chefs who have seen this happen.

The next steps are to reduce the liquid in the pan and add several pats of butter to thicken and enhance the flavor of the sauce. If you ever knew how much butter professional chefs use in restaurants to "enhance" flavor, you would be amazed. It makes sense, though. Fats not only give foods wonderful body, they also carry a lot of flavor.

Adding Complexity

Now those are just the basics. To create some more complexity to the sauce you'll want to add some aromatics like garlic or shallots for a subtle but additional layer of flavor. Then you might want to add some additional ingredients such as mushrooms, mustards, chutneys, herbs and/or spices to give even more complexity and flavor.

This is how many of the classic sauces with all the fancy French names are made. By adding different ingredients to stock reductions, you can create the same sauces at home. Depending on the level you want to take it to, it can be quick and easy or a little more time consuming and complex. But no matter which way you decide to go, you will end up with a more incredible, flavorful, delicious result than if you didn't make the sauce at all.

The Right Pan

As I mentioned above, you want the caramelized brown "stuff" to stick to the pan. So it wouldn't make any sense to use a pan with a non stick surface. That only defeats the goal of creating that wonderful flavored fond. I have also read that you should stay away from cast iron pans because the iron reacts to food high in acid like red wine and gives off a metallic taste. Although I love cooking foods in my cast iron skillet, stay away if you are planning to make a pan sauce.

A Basic Reduction Sauce

You can make reductions sauces from all sorts of liquids. One of my favorites is a balsamic reduction sauce where you slowly cook down a cup of balsamic vinegar until it reduces by half or if you like, even further until it becomes syrupy. This is great to drizzle over fish, chicken or pork chops.

Another basic reduction sauce I make a lot at home is a simple pan sauce. Here’s where you sauté, lets say a chicken breast, in a sauté pan, remove it from the pan, deglaze the pan with some wine, let it cook down to an essence and then add some chicken stock or beef stock.

How much stock should you add?

If you are looking for a cup of sauce, start with two cups of stock. Basically you are going to reduce whatever liquid you are using in half. If you think the sauce should be thicker, continue cooking it down until it reaches your desired consistency.

You will often hear chefs say or cookbooks describe reducing a sauce until it is “thick enough to coat a spoon.” All this means is you dip a spoon in the sauce, and if the sauces sticks, it’s ready. If you reduce the sauce too much, just add a little more stock.

Here’s a simple recipe for making a quick reduction sauce at home.

A Basic Pan Reduction Sauce

Also see Fundamental Rules of Making a Good Pan Sauce. Kenji López-Alt says you should add gelatin to your sauce when using store bought stock to give it a more rich flavor. Restaurants make their own stock which gets its gelatin from the bones used to make the stock, but store bought stock does not have this.

This sauce is made right after you finish cooking the meat, chicken, fish, etc. You remove it from the pan and keep it warm until the sauce is done. Some chefs will undercook the meat and finish cooking it in the sauce.

2 tablespoons fat - butter, oil or some combination. If there is leftover fat from what you just cooked, use that.
1 shallot, minced
¼ cup wine (red, white or port depending on what you are cooking)
1 cup chicken, beef or vegetable stock (again depending on what you are cooking)
Salt and pepper, to taste
1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh herbs (again depending on what you are cooking)

How to Prepare at Home

Remove the meat from the sauté pan; pour off all but 2 tablespoons of fat (add fat if you need to). Remove the pan from the heat; add wine to deglaze the pan while scraping any bits stuck to the pan when cooking the meat.

Place the pan back on the heat and immediately add the shallots letting them cook while the wine reduces to an essence. Be sure to keep stirring so the shallots don’t burn and the bottom of the pan is clean.

Once the wine is almost completely cooked off, add the stock. Reduce the stock by at least half and more if you want the sauce thicker.

Taste and season with salt and pepper. Many professional chefs will add pats of butter at this point to give the sauce more flavor and that velvety shine and smooth texture. This is great but it sort of defeats the purpose of making a reduction to reduce fat and calories.

Add the finely chopped herbs and serve. That simple and delicious.

Making a Simple Pan Sauce, Step by Step

  1. Sauté your protein of choice until done. Remove from the pan and keep warm.
  2. Turn the heat to medium high, and deglaze with a flavorful liquid, scraping the pan with a spoon to dissolve all the fond. Reduce by at least 1/3, to taste.
  3. When the reduction is a bit syrupy, remove from the heat.
  4. Taste and add salt and pepper, if necessary.
  5. Swirl in a pat of butter or a splash of cream to finish the sauce, round out the flavors and give it some added body.

Since pan sauces can be intensely flavored, you really only need one or two tablespoons per serving. So, to make a pan sauce for a family of four, you will only need about 1/2 cup of sauce.

Variations

Of course, the trick is to use complementary flavors. To make an Italian-inspired pan sauce, you might use a mixture of stock and Chianti, perhaps stir in some tomato paste along with some garlic, flavor it with basil and/or oregano and finish the sauce with some olive oil.

For a French twist, consider adding minced shallot, stirring in some Dijon mustard, using stock and white wine for the deglazing liquid and flavoring with some tarragon, lavender or Herbes de Provence.

You can even make a great sauce with Asian flavors by sautéing some fresh ginger and stirring in some peanut butter in Step 2, flavoring with some five spice powder and deglazing with a lemony chicken stock. Finish the sauce with some toasted sesame oil.

Remember, a quick pan sauce is about using a series of techniques—sauteing, deglazing, reducing and enriching—and not so much about following a strict recipe.