Sauces with wine in them add extra flavor and complexity to your favorite dishes.
Initially used before refrigeration to cover the taste of foods that had gone bad, sauces reinvented by French cuisine in the 18th century turned that notion on its head. Sauces, frequently containing wines, became flavorful, rich enhancements to food. Different sauces call for different wines. As a rule of thumb, choose cooking wines of the best quality you can afford and the same ones that you choose for drinking.
Brown Sauces
For a brown sauce, use a red wine. These sauces contain stronger flavors -- from herbs, tomato puree and browned vegetables -- than white sauces. Brown sauces are those you see in dishes such as hearty beef or chicken stews. Two examples are beef burgundy and coq au vin. Karen Page and Andres Dornenburg, authors of "The Flavor Bible," recommend either a Merlot or Cabernet Sauvignon for these sauces.
White Sauces
Use a white wine for b chamel sauce, made by stirring milk into a butter-flour roux, or for veloute sauce, made by stirring stock into the same roux. Legendary chef and author Julia Child advises choosing a white wine that is full-bodied, like Chardonnay. However, she also adds that she rarely has an open bottle of any white wine available for cooking and turns to a dry white French vermouth instead, using 2/3 cup of vermouth for each cup of white wine called for in a recipe.
Special Sauces
The rich, complex flavors in wine go well in a variety of specialty sauces to add depth and a touch of pleasant acidity to recipes. Try adding a small amount of Merlot or Cabernet Sauvignon to your favorite barbecue sauce. For veal and chicken dishes, some chefs add sherry to either a white or brown sauce. Sharon and Ron Herbst, authors of "The Deluxe Food Lover's Companion," recommend Fino, a Spanish sherry, for delicate sauces, or Amontillado sherry for a stronger, nutty flavor. They also recommend Portuguese Madeira, a fortified wine similar to sherry, over American Madeira.
Dessert Sauces
Try Cognac or rum in a creme Anglaise custard sauce, and Marsala or sherry plus vermouth in an Italian Zabaione sauce. For flamb dishes, Sharon and Ron Herbst recommend brandy or rum that is 80-proof, because liquor with more alcohol could explode when lighted. Food Network star Sandra Lee uses port wine in a sauce for poached pears. The best ports, according to the Herbsts, are those from Portugal that include the word "vintage" in its label as opposed to "tawny" or "ruby" port.
Tags: white wine, brown sauce, Cabernet Sauvignon, made stirring, Merlot Cabernet, Merlot Cabernet Sauvignon