Sauce Sense

Jan 1, 2006 12:00 PM, Diane Ridge

Bite into a forkful of hot steamed fish topped with cool Red Pepper Onion Mango Sauce and the fresh flavors of the Caribbean explode in your mouth. At once you taste the earthy brine of the sea, the sweet of the fruit and the hot spiciness of ginger and red pepper (see recipe, page 46).

This enticing melding of flavors on the tongue is due in part to nature and in part to a chef's careful culinary engineering. "Foods are chemical mixtures, so we seldom encounter any of the basic taste sensations (sweet, salty, bitter, sour, umami) in isolation. They all play a role in our taste perceptions," says Leslie Stein, a scientist with Monell Senses Center in Philadelphia. "The appeal of a mix of flavors like in a rich sauce or salsa may be due in part to ongoing scientific studies that are pointing to the fact that sweet and umami (savory) tastes share the same receptors on the tongue," she says. (See How We Taste, page 44.)

For chefs, sauces (including salsa and chutney) are a particularly good medium for adding an intriguing flavor dimension to menu items. This means incorporating ingredients such as alcohol (wine, fortified spirits) fruits and berries (juices and nectars); honey, and vinegar; and utilizing cooking methods—such as caramelizing to release natural sweetness—to add or enhance incomparable richness to sauces and a wow factor to the overall dish.

"You can completely adjust the flavor of a dish by using sauces," says Chef David Barry, lecturing instructor at the Culinary Institute of America, in Hyde Park, NY.

"Look at ingredients such as wine, fortified wine, vinegars and fruit juices to add nuance and complexity to the overall dish."

In the case of wine Barry advises chefs to consider the dish as a whole to determine the taste "effect" they want to ellicit. "Are you trying for a classic sweet-and-sour sauce to enhance duck? Or, do you want a more savory herb sauce to complement a roast beef tenderloin? The result will depend on the reduction and the type of wine used."

You want the sauce to be an integral part of the dish—to complement the food," he adds. (For some help on pairing wine for sauce, see the sidebar below.)

Barry strongly suggests reducing wines slowly, at low simmer. "You'll get a finer flavor than reducing them by fast boiling," he says.

And onsite chefs, who generally cook in large volumes, need not shy away from using spirits to enhance sauces, says Barry.

"As long as they are used on a consistent— daily—basis to ensure freshness and are not overproduced, onsite chefs can have wonderful sauce bases easily on hand," he says. Gently reduce aromatics and wine down about one-third and reduce demi-glace down, also about one-third. "You can keep it on hand a week or two, as long as it's refrigerated, labelled and only put out at the saute station as needed."

Using vinegars can dramatically define a sauce to enhance the entree it accompanies," says Barry. "Consider a sweet balsamic vinegar. It's used in relishes and salsa to add a hint of sour and it can also enhance the sweetness of a sauce. Vinegar ties all the ingredients together," he says. Other types of vinegar balance butter or flavor content and help to stabilize an emulsion sauce, such as hollandaise.

Fruit juices lighten or brighten sauces with their acid, particularly the citrus and tropical fruit families. "Fruit juices lend incredible flavor concentration," says Barry. "It's suprising how different they become when reduced—incredibly sweet and bright— changing the whole flavor of the dish."

Cooking with Wine

Following are tips from Marianne Frantz, director of the Cleveland (OH) Wine School, for getting the most out of your wine pantry:

Use wine to deglaze the pan when making reduction sauces. The alcohol in wine acts as an intense solvent dissolving the pan drippings and adding rich flavor that water alone cannot impart.
To further incorporate the flavors of wine into the dish or sauce, always simmer/boil-off the wine. After deglazing the pan, reducing the wine speeds up the evaporation of alcohol and water, which in turn mellows the sharp alcohol taste and concentrates the fruity aroma, sweetness and acidity. (Frantz notes that red wine requires more time to reduce in order to remove coloring compounds—from dark purple to ruby red—and avoid coloring the food.) Finally, alcohol will curdle a cream sauce unless you boil it off.
Use wine that is good enough to drink. Why? Wine affects the flavor profile of the dish. The wine does not have to be expensive but it should be of good quality. Cooking with wine that is poor in quality will impart bitter and sour flavors to the dish.
Using leftover wine is fine. The wine you use when cooking does not have to be "just opened." The act of cooking will dull fresh flavors in the wine anyway. Additionally, in catering, cooking with wine is economical if you coordinate with the bar manager/wine steward and use leftover wine from the bar—it offers a great opportunity to keep your by-the-glass program fresh.
Use wines that enhance—not fight—the flavor of the food. The body of the wine should match the body of the food.
Dry white such as Sauvignon Blanc is great for lighter sauces. For bolder dishes/sauces, try a wine with a more powerful flavor profile such as Riesling or Viognier. Dry reds such as Zinfandel and Syrah are great in rustic dishes and sauces.
The four basic tastes—sweet, salty, sour and bitter—have to be taken into consideration when selecting the right wine for a dish.
Sweet/Salty foods require a contrasting wine to cleanse the palate. Sweetness allows the flavors to burst. In other words, sweet wines will taste less sweet when put into salty foods and sweet wines can make salty food more appealing. Gewurztraminer and Riesling are great complements for spicy Asian sauces or sauces used in soy or olive dishes. Dessert wines are great for making fruit desserts. Try a lesser-priced example like Monbazillac, Coteaux du Layon or Vouvray.
Salty: Stir clear of oaky wines such as New World Chardonnays and big tannic reds. Salty dishes enhance the wood oak tannin found in each.
Acid: The acidity of the wine should be sufficient to match the acidity found in the sauce or dish. High acid wines such as Sauvignon Blanc and Riesling will result in tangy sauces that are great set against high fat foods. Wines that are naturally higher in acid include Sauvignon Blanc, Pinot Grigio, Pinot Noir and Sangiovese.
Bitter: Bitterness in wine stems from the tannins found in young reds such as Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Zinfandel. Fattier foods soften the tannic nature of some reds—as such they are good companions for cooking fattier meats like roasts or preparing sauces for the same.
Umami: It is best to think about the savory flavor profiles that the food and wine have in common—something the Japanese call umami. For example, the earthiness of Pinot Noir with mushrooms or buttery sauces with Chardonnay are great umami pairings.
If you want to keep wine selection for sauce simple, stay within the country or region of the food. Remember, most wines are made to go with the food of the region, so Italian wine is great in Italian cooking, French for French etc...
Fortified wines or wines that have extra alcohol added during the wine making process are great for making flavorintense meat and poultry sauces.
Dry fino-styled Sherries such as a high-quality Amontillada, Rainwater Madera, Marsala or ruby Port, offer great richness in the kitchen. Fortified wines also have the added benefit of lasting for a few weeks once they are open resulting in very little waste.
(Cognac in dessert sauces adds depth and flavor, especially to chocolate and fruit based desserts.)
Some foods contain compounds that are not particularly "wine friendly." Asparagus has a chemical compound called mercaptans that alters the flavor profile of the wine; artichokes have a chemical compound called cynarin that enhances the sweetness of foods, making the wine seem sweeter than it actually is; and hot peppers turn up the heat on any alcohol used in the sauce and tend to make oaky wines taste even oakier.
And, while balsamic vinegar can contribute complexity to a sauce, most vinegars can rob the wine of its fruit, leaving astringent flavors behind.
If you want to taste the vinous qualities of the wine, add it in as a final ingredient. The longer you cook wine the less alcohol—and flavor—will be present in the final sauce. If you are using an expensive wine with lots of complexity, do not cook it for long periods of time. Doing so will result in loss of flavor.
Most importantly, avoid using cooking wine. They are typically poor in quality and have added salt.

How we Taste

It is generally accepted that we taste different flavors—sweet, salty, bitter and sour—on distinct parts of our tongue. Yet research shows that all tastes are represented in each tastebud. Additionally, the taste of umami has been recognized and studied for more than three decades yet has only made inroads to the public concsiousness in the past few years.

"Umami might be the unique sensory experience triggered by glutamate, an amino acid found throughout the human body and in protein-containing foods such as meat, fish, tomatoes, peas, and parmesan cheese," says Leslie Stein, PhD, at Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia.

Glutamate elicits a sensation which is often desribed as full-bodied, meaty, and savory. Umami differs from the other basic tastes in that it doesn't seem to impart a particular taste quality. Instead, umami appears to interact with other taste stimuli to enhance the flavor of food.

The interesting thing here is that recent biochemical studies have revealed a separate taste receptor that can detect this amino acid, increasing the likelihood that umami is, in fact, a distinct taste sensation.

Still, why does that sweet, hot salsa taste particularly delicious with savory grilled proteins? Because the recent research also suggests that umami and sweet taste receptors share a common structural subunit (the T1R3 receptor).

For an in-depth look into taste sensation check out www.monell.org, the web site of Monell Chemical Senses Center.