after thickening A satisfying sauce offers stimulation to most of our chemical senses A sauce that doesn’t seem quite right is probably deficient in one or more tastes, or doesn’t carry enough aroma The cook can taste the sauce actively for its saltiness, sweetness, acidity, savoriness, and aroma, and then try to correct the deficiencies while maintaining the overall balance of flavors Sauce Consistency Though the main point of sauces is their flavor, we also enjoy them for their consistency, their feeling in the mouth And problems with consistency — with the sauce’s physical structure — are far more likely than flavor problems to make a sauce unusable Curdled or congealed or separated sauces are not pleasant to look at or to feel in the mouth So it’s good to understand the physical structures of common sauces, how they’re put together and how they’re ruined Food Dispersions: Mixtures That Create Texture The base ingredient in nearly all flavorful food liquids is water That’s because foods themselves are mostly water Meat juices, vegetable and fruit purees are all obviously watery; cream and mayonnaise and the hot egg sauces less obviously so, but they too are built on water In each of these preparations, water is the continuous phase: the material that bathes all the other components, the material in which all the other components swim (The only common exceptions are some vinaigrettes and butter and nut butters, in which fat is the continuous phase.) Those other components are the dispersed phase The task of giving sauces a desirable consistency is a matter of making the continuous, base phase of water seem less ... each of these preparations, water is the continuous phase: the material that bathes all the other components, the material in which all the other components swim (The only common exceptions are...So it’s good to understand the physical structures of common sauces, how they’re put together and how they’re ruined Food Dispersions: Mixtures That Create Texture The base ingredient in nearly all flavorful food liquids is water... vinaigrettes and butter and nut butters, in which fat is the continuous phase.) Those other components are the dispersed phase The task of giving sauces a desirable consistency is a matter of making the continuous, base phase of water seem less