Gravy is a very British obsession. The gravy-off on these pages was inspired by a debate among the delicious. team during the planning day for our Christmas issue – vastly differing opinions revealing how strongly people feel about the runny stuff on their Christmas plate… Should it be thick or thin? Poured over the roasties or not? The jury’s out.
We set our mother and son team head-to-head over a hot stove with no idea what to expect when it came to their generational gravy war. Would tradition prevail over cheffyness? The results are revealed overleaf…
It’s clear that an appreciation of gravy is ingrained in our psyche, and our history as a nation of gravy lovers goes way back. The large dinner parties so popular with the Victorians were grand and steeped in tradition, with the gravy boat passed round anticlockwise, starting from the head of the table. Often it was empty by the time it reached the fourth or fifth guest, and, although butlers could intervene, replacing the empty vessel with a new one, the people at the far end of the table would sometimes miss out. As a result, gravy became marked as a sauce with status.
Gravy is the only sauce that came to have its own special receptacle. The trend for silver sauce boats hit Britain in the 18th century, influenced by the fashionable French court, but silver was soon swapped for English porcelain and the gravy within was our own invention. Leiths Techniques Bible makes the distinction between a French jus, made by deglazing a roasting pan with stock and wine before reducing, and British gravy, produced from the roasting juices but thickened with a roux made from flour, dripping and stock. What both parties can agree on, in the words of uber-chef Michel Roux, is “The quality of the stock will determine the success of your sauce.” Delia agrees in her Complete How to Cook, denouncing “cubes, packets and granules with long lists of chemicals, producing an instant gelatinous gloop”. Nigella describes a cranberry-infused confection in her book Christmas as “a strange, savoury coulis”, whereas chef Simon Hopkinson makes teal-coloured gravy using cognac and marmalade.
GRAVY ETIQUETTE
Debrett’s, the authority on modern manners, recommends using a spoon or ladle, if provided, rather than pouring directly from the gravy jug.