The other night I was cooking some nice pepper stuffed chicken breast with a nice wine sauce, and realize just how far I have come on my sauce and gravy making.  I wanted to share my techniques for making completely lump free sauces and gravies.  There are three different techniques that I use depending on what I am cooking. If I am cooking something that is going to be a fat based sauce (anything butter based, alfredo's, etc), you want to make a rue in order to thicken your sauce.  The main thing with this type of sauce is that you must know this ahead of time.   What a rue is, is basically melting some butter in a pan (or heating up whatever fat your sauce or gravy is based on) and stirring in flour until it forms into a sort of paste.  This paste will then dissolve nicely when you start adding the rest of your liquid ingredients to your sauce.  I personally don't use this technique very often, but it does work great for thickening a sauce without getting lumps. The second technique I use, I use mostly for stir fry.  If, for example, I want to make a nice, thick, creamy chicken curry I would use this technique.  What you do here is soak your chicken in a liquid mixture (in this case it would be rice wine vinegar, a little soy sauce, and some sesame oil) and mix in cornstarch.  Mixing the cornstarch in here, while the liquids are cold will allow the cornstarch to dissolve naturally, thus no lumps.  What I then do is let the chicken marinate for awhile as I prepare the other ingredients.  I pull the chicken out of the mixture with tongs and place it into a hot wok.  I mainly just brown the chicken on all side (using the maillard reaction) and then remove it from the wok.  I will then place in my garlic, onions, mushrooms, and etc and cook for a minute or two.  I then use the marinate to deglaze the pan ( pouring this mixture in while the pan is very hot, this removes all the nice "bits" on the bottom of the pan).  Since we have already put in the cornstarch, this mixture will start to thicken very quickly.  I then return the chicken to the wok, cover, and cook until done.  If the sauce starts to get too thick, I will add a little chicken stock to thin it out a little. The third technique I use is the one I use most often.  This can be used for making almost any sauce or gravy.  It is so simple and amazing you will want to kick yourself for not knowing about it before.  About 10 minutes before you are going to be ready to thicken your sauce or gravy, take a heaping tablespoon of cornstarch and submerge it gently in COLD water.  When you are ready to thick, remove the spoon and use it (with the lump of cornstarch still on it) to gently stir your sauce or gravy.  You will see that the sauce will slowly melt the cornstarch off of your spoon and will thicken very nicely...with absolutely ZERO lumps.  If your spoon gets empty and your sauce still needs thickening, repeat the process.  This technique works so amazingly that it is almost always the technique I use.  Try it out.  You will not be disappointed, and neither will your friends or family that you cook for. Athena Foods - Cook Like a Goddess ...read more