EVOO vs. Butter

Instead of butter, will Olive Oil work as a substitute when making sauces or roux, flavor aside?

The Traditional French way to make a roux is with butter, but all it really is are equal parts fat and flour, so yes it would work. But it is worth it to use butter, for me at least.

If you're going to do that, 86 the EVOO and go with regular oil. Using extra virgin would be a waste of flavor and it'd be lost in the process.

Ciao,

It will? Like making a roux for French Onion soup and with sauce recipes as well? That's great. I plan to flavor the EVOO with garlic and seasoning salt. That combination works great with toasted or grilled bread instead of butter and the flavor is in the neighborhood, anyway.

Butter there for flavor your oil is there because it lessens the chances of your butter burning. I agree with SteveA 86 the EVOO and use regular oil.

Rgds Rook

I agree... I just personally like butter, but I have used EVOO and regular oil and they have worked just fine... When I worked in Boston (YEARS AGO!!!) for very delicate dishes we used a gee.

If you want... Cut the butter with oil... That way u can have the butter flavor and the smoking point will increase.

Harold McGee says:
http://www.cheftalk.com/forums/showthread.php?t=15769

Phil

Why even use roux to make a sauce anyway? (theres a reason restaurants no longer do this) If you need a thickener just use a little starch slurry (corn, potato, arrowroot, etc...) to finish. You can also make a vegetable purée and add it to your sauce to finish - thickens as well as adds flavour.

Roux is the traditional way to do it and that is the way some people do it... I often use rouxs, but I also use cornstarch and arrowroot alot... It depends on what I am doing.

As for Harold McGee, I am not going to start an arguement, but it is my belief that olive oil will burn slower than butter becuase of the milk solids, it is impossible for them to burn at the same exact time, if it were a gee or clarified butter, it would be a different story.

Here's a different perspective. Heat olive oil to 400F. Add butter. The butter will burn.

Whoa! Wait a minute fellas I did not say it would not burn I just said lessens the chances and Phatch your reference to Harold Mcgees book is a good one going to have to read up on what he says thanks.

Rgds Rook

Butter solids burn at a certain temp. Once that temp is reached, it will burn. If you heat 1c butter in a pan it will burn at a certain temp. If you put 1T of butter in 1c of EVOO that butter will burn when that same temp is reached.

Everything burns at a certain temp unless dissolved in water.

Im sorry, my mistake, totally my fault and I apologize... I thought that you were saying butter burns at the same temperature as evoo, not that the butter will burn no matter if it is in oil or not... my apologies again.

I am inclined to butter only, longer, slower perhaps, but what a happy outcome. Evoo has its place, obviously, but butter wins, pat down.

Anyway, what sauces are you talking about? Really, the only time in the last 10 years I've ever used roux is for gravy and soups, not sauce. :)

Now whut is this flavor aside stuff? I think you need to get the sheep skin from kindergarten afore you graduate up to axing silly complicated questions to exspurts. Whut part o yankeeland is you from my boy?

bigwheel

I guess you are right, more soups and gravy's, but just yesterday I did a gig for 80 people and made a very large amount of Marsala sauce , which I thinkened with a roux.

As everybody else seems to understand, he is asking what difference using extra-virgin olive oil in place of butter will make when making roux, other than the obvious difference in flavor. Seeing as everyone else understood this, this begs the question of just exactly who is in need of their sheepskin.

Two sayings apply here: 1. There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers, and 2. If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.

On the topic, if you were making a dark roux, you might want to use an oil with a high smoke point to avoid any burnt flavor in your roux. Olive oil doesn't have as high a smoke point as other oils. Also, as mentioned before, cooking destroys the flavor of the extra-virgin olive oil. A cheaper, neutral-flavored oil with a higher smoke point is your best bet.

Well the way I interpreted the narrative was the boy claims to want to make a roux but he dont care whut it tastes like (flavor aside)...which begs the question if a person is gonna make a roux and dont care whether or not it tastes like caca..Whut be the point of trying to make roux to start with? Or at the very least why would it matter if he used butter..olive oil..schmaltz or Mobil 1? In this particular scenario I did not feel the inquiry rated a doctoral disertation in the black art/science of roux cookery at least until the seeker provided more info on his goals. I just love pedantic lectures on morality and compooter nettiquite. Thanks so much.

bigwheel

For a Blond Roux, Butter is your best bet, for if you are looking for a dark roux for dark gravys perhaps, use cheaper oils.

Well see just as I suspected the original poster to this non sense has done flew the coop so glad to have not expended a bunch of energy on it. Now any right minded cajun know not to use butter to make roux cuz it burns too easy. Try some cheap oleo margarine or regular old hawg lard..or if you want the best use Cottonseed oil. Now this be cajun food roux of course. If a person is making something called a roux which is a raw sissified mixture of flour and butter that Emeril uses to thicken up tater soup etc. this do not apply. It hard to discuss stuff when nobody knows whut we supposed to be talking about huh?

bigwheel

As I Said... for a blond roux, butter is best... Becuase you are not getting it to a burning stage... you are just melting and adding the flour... so butter is fine...

A simple explanation allows everyone reading this thread of all backgrounds to be on the same page. A forum is for discussion. Not everyone will interpret a question or answer in the same way, this is the beauty of a forum.

This is an assumption, not everyone has time to live online and I see a healthy discussion addressing different scenarios. There are forums I many not revisit for days, weeks, or even months. A question was posed, and a topic introduced. Threads are not only for the original poster, but for everyone else who wishes to discuss the topic and even more who only read.

Butter is not "better" or "worse", it is the fat of choice for certain types of roux depending on the cuisine. And the quality of ingredients do matter. Butter over margarine, unsalted butter over salted butter, homemade butter over storebought butter.

Now, butter or oil? "Flavor aside", how do different fats react in different rouxs? Is it possible to substitute one for the other? Obviously the answer is yes, it is possible but not only flavor is changed. Is it recommended to use one or the other? If someone requires oil over butter for health or other reasons, then there are ways to make it work. Deciding which fat to use depends on which roux is being referred to and we can address them all in this thread.

Bigwheel: I'm going to start editing your posts if you can't edit them yourselves.

Yeah, that makes sense, thanks. Would I be right in assuming that, in finishing off a sauce - especially those where the fat is usually added for body and 'glaziness', that EVOO would be fine since it incorporates quickly in the sauce and heat is not that big of a factor?

Those are precisely the ideas I had in mind, thanks. I realize there are not always simple answers. Health is a factor that is here to stay, like it or not. And many recipes are far too complex and expensive to risk botching them.

And there are many other complex recipes that use butter as a base, first to saute, then a sauce builds from there as the recipe develops.

Thanks again, everyone, it's a big help already. I can't use butter but I don't want to give up the recipes. I still want to figure out a way to make my favorite dish, traditional Lobster Thermidor, for an extreme example, and to use either the Louis P. DeGouy or the Daniel Rogov recipe.

:chef:

IveyLeaguer,

Could you be more specific as to why you can not use butter, there may be alternatives other than normal oils if you can provide more info.

Of course, if this is a health issue, there are other ways to thicken sauces beyond roux, as someone mentioned earlier. From using cornstarch to reducing the liquid, there are many ways to thicken a sauce, each one producing a slightly different result.

MIKEB:
Good Morning. Your proposal to use a starch to use as a thickner is used in low-priced food eateries. It is used there because of the less cost involved. This technique has a name it is referred to as "A WHITE WASH". In a few words this concoction lacks flavor, that is another reason why it is not used.
As Chef Torrie said the roux is the accepted thickner in medium & upscale restaurants. Good luck & have a nice day.
~Z~BESTUS.

There's a hobby forum I belong to out there and this topic is strangely reminiscent of a couple topics on it. One of them being "Track Power or Battery". This topic can conjure up some of the most interesting views I've ever seen. I guess the same coule be said here.

Personally I have always used butter when making a roux. At time and in differnt moods it has been whole or clarified. There have been also times I have cut this butter with canola, peanut or EVOO. If I used canola or peanut oil it was when I was making a black roux for my gumbo or ettouffee sauce. Slurries(sp?) have no real place in my professionl kitchen. At home well due to rising grocery bills and shrinking pay (or so it would seem) rouxs are more for food prepared during the Holidays. Although this is not to say that out of sheer need and necessity I haven't on a couple occasions tried to bring a sauce back from the grave with a slurry.

With that said... IMHPO, Butter is better. It's proper and it's unrivaled in it's ability as a thickening technique and flavor. But then you be the judge. Make make one type of sauce thicken with the three differnt rouxs. One butter, one cut butter and one all oil. If you can't tell the difference then it really doesn't matter. Just remeber this...It's not "huile" Manié, "huile" blanc or Monté au "huile".:D (please excuse me since my French is atrocious:D)