Topic: Pre-cooked Stock In Gravy

[littlechilie]

Hi all,
After just making a wonderful gravy with stock,I'm wondering how many of us are using the stock from pre-cooking chicken and veg in our gravy?
After chatting with my local Restaurant they confirmed to me that nothing is wasted in the cooking, this includes there stock from Pre-cooked veg and chicken.   

Their gravy is deep and aromatic in smell, nothing like the gravy we produce, could it be there is two or three stocks combined in to one aromatic sauce.

My local restaurant stock pot has a tap near the bottom of the pot for straining sauce.

I'm guessing mild, vegetarian dishes use a basic pure onion carrot base.

Any thoughts ?

[Derek Dansak]

Hi all, long time no see !

I am convinced stock is critical

BIR cook massive amounts of meat each week (unlike a home cook)

They must use this process to add a little something we cant do so easily at home.

recently I make plain onion bases with no spice !

I do however add the best quality chicken stock I can find

I have noticed after a few days the base does mature, and it produces a depth of flavour in the curry that has that old quality.  The stock is mellowing after 1 -2 days

Last week I actually cooked off a quick madras with lots of butter ghee,  hint of methi, bit of salt and was blown away with the result.

The curry had an old taste to it and was certainly the nearest I ever got to that Moorish meaty taste
typical of bangledesh bir curry. Not 100 % clone but much nearer than I ever got before.

Importantly the moorrish taste was coming through.

I was not expecting this taste , so was quite shocked. Definitely going to have to repeat this again

You do need the right stock. My own home made stock was wrong when I tried that last year.

So clearly the stock needs to be top notch .

[ELW]

I normally add the meat with the cooking liquor littlechillie, sometimes using a ladle, rather than dry pieces of meat like most of the videos available to date.
Stocks have been discussed on here plenty , but combining the stocks sounds like a decent idea
Place I was in recently had an open kitchen & the chef constantly added something from the frying pans to his smaller pot of working gravy.


Regards
ELW

[JerryM]

It really boils down to each members preference.

For me its  big big no. I have tried it and no Likey.

I've tasted 2 off real BIR base and neither had stock of any sort.

In making pre cooks it really does sound wrong that all that goodness is thrown away. I can't work out where or how else it could be used.  Other than using the carryover liquid in some dishes works ok

[littlechilie]

Yep all good points here guys, I'm usually a plain base guy myself onions, carrots turmeric and haldi !

For me I cooked a madras with the base and chicken stock and it didn't quite work for me this time  So I will be sticking to what I know best I think  :

Happy cooking All.

[Onions]

In making pre cooks it really does sound wrong that all that goodness is thrown away. I can't work out where or how else it could be used.  Other than using the carryover liquid in some dishes works ok

I wonder if that's the crux of it- the method of precooking used? If they fry it up in some base, spices etc then there should as you say be some quality oily gravy 'goodness' left to use elsewhere- but, if they do the par-boil technique, then what's left- water, to all intents and purposes?- could presumably get thrown out with the dishwater with no loss to them?

[Naga]

I used to save the pre-cooked chicken liquor in a reduced form as, like others, it seemed sacrilege just to punt it. It certainly enriched any subsequent dish I used it in, but always to the detriment of the intended flavour and style of the dish.

It also thickened the gravy too quickly, which made a difference to the final stages of reduction.

Eventually, I stopped doing it as was interfering too much with my curries.

I could see the liquor/stock being used in particular restaurant applications, or to enhance water-based gravies in traditional cooking, but my personal experience mitigates against its used in run-of-the-mill BIR cooking.

Not that my BIR cooking is at all run-of-the-mil!

[littlechilie]

It's the lamb stock I cant get my head around, it's expensive stock,the oil produced from it must be heavenly !

Chicken and lamb stock can be combined I believe ? That must be some rich stock leftover right there. now I know I would be taking that home not down the drain

[Onions]

Maybe they keep it for staff curries, which are more 'trad'? -chickens (e.g.) slow cooked in stock and spices?

[littlechilie]

Yep you could be right on that! Guess I may ask next time I'm out for dinner.