How to Make a Roux
Flour and fat, stirred slow — baked chicken and gravy, smothered pork chops, gumbo, crawfish etouffee, sausage gravy — for cooks who want real gravy at home.
★ dinner
dinnerCrawfish Bisque (Roux Version)
A rich and flavorful crawfish bisque made with a classic roux, vegetables, and seasoned with herbs and spices.
Em ✿Ingredients
- 3–4 lb crawfish tails
- 2–3 tbsp Avacado oil
- 2 tbsp butter
- 2 tbsp flour
- 1 onion, diced
- 4 celery stalks, chopped
- 1 carrot, chopped
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- to taste salt & pepper
- 6 thyme sprigs
- 3 bay leaves
- 64 oz chicken or seafood stock
- 4–6 oz dry white wine
- 3 oz tomato paste
- 1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
- 1/2 tsp paprika
- 6–8 oz heavy cream
Instructions
- 1Heat oil in a large pot. Cook onion, celery, and carrot 8–10 minutes until soft. Add garlic and cook 30 seconds.
- 2Add butter and flour. Stir constantly 2–3 minutes to make a light roux.
- 3Stir in tomato paste, paprika, and cayenne. Cook 1–2 minutes.
- 4Add white wine and scrape bottom of the pot.
- 5Add stock, thyme, bay leaves, salt, and pepper. Simmer for 45–60 minutes.
- 6Remove thyme and bay leaves. Blend until smooth. Strain if desired.
- 7Return to the pot. Stir in cream and reserved crawfish tails. Simmer for 2–3 minutes.
- 8Taste and adjust seasoning. Optional: finish with Worcestershire, butter, parsley, or green onions.
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Open in Pepper →Flour And Oil And A Little Patience
A roux is just flour and fat cooked together, but it's the difference between thin, pale gravy and something that coats the back of a spoon. Once you can feel when it's ready — by color, by smell — you can make gravy, gumbo, or a cream sauce without a recipe in front of you.
Cooks on Pepper reach for these on the nights they want something that tastes like it took all day, or when there's a pack of pork chops and a little flour and that's about it.
Every recipe here leans on a roux somewhere: Baked Chicken and Gravy, Smothered Pork Chops with Mushroom Gravy, Country Chicken Fried Steak w/ Gravy, The Best Southern Sausage Gravy, Cajun Chicken & Sausage Gumbo with Rice, Crawfish Etouffee with Cheese Grits, and a plain Roux recipe to practice on.
Quick Tips
- 1
Use equal parts fat and flour
Start with 1 cup oil to 1 cup flour for gumbo-sized batches, or 3 tablespoons each for a skillet of gravy. Even amounts keep it smooth.
- 2
Keep the heat medium
High heat scorches flour in seconds and turns the whole pot bitter. Medium to medium-low gives you 20 to 45 minutes of control for a dark roux.
- 3
Stir without stopping
Use a flat-edged wooden spoon or whisk and keep it moving across the bottom of the pan. Walking away for even 30 seconds can leave black specks.
- 4
Add cool liquid slowly
Pour in broth or milk a half cup at a time, whisking hard between each addition, so the gravy thickens smooth instead of lumping up.
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