The Turkey Gravy Thickener that Grandma Ignored

My Grandmother used cornstarch to make turkey gravy. My Mother inherited this procedure of dissolving cornstarch in water to thicken the drippings. Well, this generational laziness stops here! If your family is like mine, your elders will be sliding the roasting pan from the oven in a few weeks. The bird is brown and fragrant with simmering and sputtering fats in the bottom of the pan. Just before she’ll carve turkey, Grandma will turn your holiday meal into Chinese food. A cornstarch slurry thickener for your turkey gravy gives it a glassy slick mouth feel like Kung Po Beef. Butter has much better flavor, melts in your mouth, and gives a better texture when thickening sauces. A simple butter/flour roux is the best way to make homemade gravy and making your roux in advance will save you time, allow you the flexibility to make more gravy quickly, and improve the overall flavor of the sauce you’ll put on your mashed potatoes. Don’t tell me that butter is more fattening. I already know that. But, we’re already eating cookies, pies, cakes, potatoes, turkey, stuffing, salad, rolls, and on and on. What’s the harm of a little more butter to make a great sauce? Roux is simple to make by simply melting any quantity of butter in a sauce pan. Add an equal amount of flour, or just enough to make a paste-like consistency and start to cook out the proteins. Proteins in the flour is what will give a pasty or floury taste to your sauce, so this combination of butter and flour must be cooked until it goes from yellow to white and gives off a nutty aroma. You can continue cooking this blonde roux until it becomes brown if you prefer a darker turkey gravy, but keep in mind that a brown roux has half the thickening power of a blond roux. You’ll have to prepare twice as much brown roux to thicken the same amount of liquid. Whether blonde or brown, store your roux in a ceramic ramekin, or allow it to cool and scrape from the pan into a plastic container. This is now your instant thickener for any type of liquid, whether poultry broth or milk for your cheese sauce. The secret behind a great turkey gravy is roux instead of cornstarch. Butter and flour give better flavor and texture to all sauces. Perhaps even Grandma and Mom will catch on this year.