Gravy question

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

Yesterday at a Thanksgiving dinner, one of the guests has celiac disease, meaning no gluten. I, and another guest, tried making gravy for her and it was a dismal failure.

Normally I'd make gravy with pan drippings, then make a roux of butter and flour, then add chicken or turkey broth. We tried doing it with corn starch and were spectacularly unsuccessful.

The additional problem was that the host had baked the chicken in one of those aluminum pans, which meant that there was a greasy residue, not real pan drippings as I think of them. Yuck. If I were dictator of North America I'd totally ban those pans. Some years ago I went shopping for such an aluminum pan and the day before Thanksgiving, but I couldn't find any, so I wound up buying a Calaphon (at least I think that's the brand) roasting pan with a rack. Best ninety five dollars I have ever spent. For one thing, my turkeys roast up much faster. For another, I get the kind of drippings that make good gravy.

But more to the point, because I do want to accommodate those who cannot digest gluten, what should I have done? The juice/drippings/whatever that was in the aluminum pan had a high degree of grease, that we weren't really able to skim off. I really, really need to acquire one of those things that allow you do pour off the drippings while leaving the grease behind. Anyway, help. I need it, because this problem (celiac issue) might well come up again.

Can anyone help?

[MADem]

1. Have you tried making your regular recipe w/gluten-free flour?

http://www.kingarthurflour.com/shop/items/gluten-free-multi-purpose-flour

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

2. Wow. I had NO idea there was a gluten free flour out there.

At least part of my ignorance is that I myself have no problems with gluten. And so I'm somewhat happily stuck in my usual way of cooking.

There is always a possibility that the person with celiac disease will again show up, and I will simply ask for enough of a heads up to acquire this. It would be wonderful to make gravy as I usually do, and if the flour is gluten free, so much the better.

How wonderful to get so swift a response!

[MADem]

3. I have a few PITA snowflakes in my extended family.

They aren't celiacs, but they claim to be "gluten sensitive." They're full of shit because they magically overcome their sensitivity when the really tasty, flaky good pastries show up, and they pig out and then seek more attention as they claim that they endure after-effects.

Anyway, I humor them with snowflake food because I'm a nice sort! I even get them the gluten free pasta, which, to me, tastes like cardboard. If they want to eat tasteless crap as an attention seeking device, fine with me.

Celiacs, OTOH, can get dreadfully ill if they ingest gluten. I don't include them in my snark--they have a legitimate medical issue. Keep those prep areas separate--that's where people get in trouble!

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

4. You are nicer than I am.

The woman at yesterday's dinner is about 90 years old, and learned a very long time ago about her condition.

I agree that most who claim "gluten insensitive" are totally full of shit.

[Cairycat]

5. It wouldn't look quite the same,

but wouldn't cornstarch work? I don't know if there's a problem with it picking up gluten during processing.

The cups to separate fat from drippings are cheap, but have never really worked out for me.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

7. I do know the cornstarch needs to be dissolved in cold water

before being added to the gravy. Which I didn't but the gravy just didn't thicken up.

I honestly think the essential problem was that the turkey had been baked in one of those aluminum pans. Instead of nice crispy drippings, there was a couple of inches of greasy soup in the bottom of the pan. Yuck.

Many years ago I know that I occasionally used cornstarch to thicken soups or stews, and recall being reasonably successful. But making a roux with butter and flour is vastly easier.

Oh, well.

[no_hypocrisy]

6. Can you substitute arrowroot for flour?

[Kali]

8. you can use cornstarch but you don't do a rue

in fact you don't even need any fat (though it tastes much better with some) - but you add it after most of the liquid is in place and at a simmer - add a tablespoon of cornstarch for each cup of gravy to a small amount of cold water or broth to dissolve, then add to the simmering sauce while stirring and cook for another minute or two.

this is for dark or broth based gravies. I personally do not approve of cornstarch-thickened milk gravy.

another option is just a reduction sauce and don't worry about mass quantities of thick gravy (yeah, me neither - I love gravy )

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

9. That's exactly what I did.

Apparently the gravy gods had it in for me.

[Kali]

10. yeah I have had it fail on occasion

not sure why, usually I think it is because I didn't use enough but it happens. I have a tendency to make any kind of gravy too thin because I don't like gravy that is more like a spread than a sauce and I am really afraid of paste. LOL

[Warpy]

11. You can thicken pan juices with cornstarch, but the procedure is different

You need to defat it as much as possible, add stock if you want to, then dissolve cornstarch in cold water and drip it in until the gravy is the desired consistency. Alas, it doesn't reheat all that well, but it does give you a low fat, tasty gravy on the big day.

The better method is making a light roux with rice flour and adding in the defatted drippings. Or you can leave all the fat in and simply add the rice flour to the roasting pan and stir, again adding flour until the right consistency is reached. Rice flour doesn't form lumps like wheat flour, but it does make the gravy a little on the gritty side. I've learned to live with it, it's not that bad. Rice gravy does reheat nicely.

Don't use rice flour to make a dark roux, it tends to get bitter when it's browned. However, it does make the full range of lighter French sauces very nicely.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

12. Thank you. That's good information.

I was a bit blind-sided when asked to make gravy, then told one of the guests has celiac disease, and the only thickening agent we had was cornstarch, which I haven't used in (no exaggeration here) about 25 years. I suspect the de-fatting was the huge issue in the gravy not thickening.

I also DETEST those aluminum pans. About ten or so years ago at my sister's house I was asked to make the gravy, and the turkey had been roasted in the aluminum pan which resulted (as I saw this year) in a couple of inches of greasy awfulness.

Here's the thing. If you want to use pan drippings for the gravy, roast the turkey on a rack in a metal pan. Or at least in an actual metal pan (no rack) NOT the aluminum pan. Buying a real roasting pan doesn't need to be that expensive -- although as mentioned above I spent about $95 on the one I now have. But that was a good twenty years ago, so at this point we're talking an amortized cost of under five bucks a year. How much do those aluminum pans cost? I honestly have no idea. But you can spend a whole lot less than what I did and it will be well worth it.

What you want is carmelized drippings. Kind of burnt. NOT a greasy soup. Shudder.

Oh, and if you do the roux -- butter and flour browned for about three or four minutes -- the flour does NOT lump. Trust me on this. For many years I made gravy by adding flour and water to the drippings (not creating a roux) and those gravies almost invariably lumped. I finally learned how to do it right. And done right, gravy is incredibly easy to make.

Anyway, this year was a one-off. The friends who invited me normally go to another city to be with family, but for various reasons stayed in town instead. I was grateful to be invited, and aside from the gravy fiasco, the meal was wonderful, the company delightful. Oh, for those of us not needing to avoid gluten, there was a store-bought turkey gravy that was perfectly acceptable.

I think on Christmas I'll be happily roasting my own turkey and making the meal I want.

But a sincere Happy Thanksgiving to all.

[Warpy]

13. Wheat flour lumps like crazy if you sprinkle it into the roasting pan

to make your gravy, my mother's preferred method. When I was a kid, I rather enjoyed the doughy lumps but now, not so much. Rice flour can be used directly in the pan with no lumping. I use sweet rice flour, a misnomer since it's not sweet, it's just white rice flour. Brown rice flour is generally used in baking but you can swap white rice four there, also.

My mother hated cooking and it showed. I never saw her attempt a roux.

I also agree wholeheartedly about the decent baking pan with a rack that fits. I bought mine about 20 years ago when I was learning how to do good Mexican flan and needed a sturdy roasting pan for the bain Marie. A sale at Amazon provided mine. People who eat a lot of meat will find themselves using it more than once a year, so it's a great investment.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

14. Yes, the wheat flour does lump it you just sprinkle it in the pan

which is what my mother always did also. And she also didn't like cooking and had almost no skills in that department. But six children, so she had to cook for us. We could be sisters. She was so terrible that I actually started doing a fair amount of the family cooking starting at age 7. I figured out a fair amount of stuff on my own, but didn't fully master gravy until well into adulthood when I finally discovered the flour and butter roux thing.

I love to cook and consider myself a pretty decent one. Turkey is something I love, and would fix several times a year back when I was married and had two kids at home. It's not at all difficult and it was fun surprising the family with it in the middle of the week.

And yes, for someone who only makes the turkey once a year buying a proper roasting pan may seem like money wasted, but it's not really.