Gravy

For a short time, after moving to Cleveland, we lived with my Grandmother on her farm. She's a good cook. She makes a lot of home style cuisine. The kind of stuff you would expect from someone in their eighties...roast, pork chops, soups, etc. She also makes some traditional Ukrainian food...borscht (Google it, if you don't know), perogies, and cabbage rolls. One of the most important things I learned from her is how to make gravy. What most people don't realize is that gravy is easy to make. I guarantee once you learn how to make it you won't ever want to buy the canned stuff again.

Basically gravy is just butter, flour, broth and seasoning. Here's a basic recipe:

2 T. butter

2 T. flour

1 cup broth

salt and pepper to taste
All you do is melt the butter over medium heat, add the flour and simmer for a minute or so (see pic), then whisk in the broth. Let everything simmer until it thickens, stirring occasionally. Then add salt and pepper to taste. That's it. The end result...gravy that you will want to drink by the gallon.

For dinner we had Beef Stroganoff. I put stew meat and a can of beef broth in the crock pot in the morning, so that it had all day to simmer. At dinnertime I sauteed mushrooms and onions in butter, then added the flour. After it simmered for a minute, I added the strained broth from the crockpot. I also added some additional broth because I tripled the above recipe. Lastly, I threw in the meat from the crockpot. Voila! I served it over noodles with a dollop of sour cream.

Some days, when I feel really motivated, I will make my own broth to use. But that's another post.