Stocks, sauces and soups

Stocks and sauces are at the heart of European restaurant food and ought to be the trump card which makes the investment in a meal worthwhile. Classical and provincial French cooking both work on a system whereby a dish can be broken down into components and put together again so that all the people sitting at a table can eat different items freshly cooked and served at the same time. Any piece of meat that takes longer than 20 minutes to cook, such as roast beef or duck, is best done in the home kitchen. Chefs however need to be able to cook meat quickly and the long, slow cooking of bones and trimmings into stocks and sauces can provide the intense flavours that are missing from a rare lamb chop or sirloin steak.