Nantua sauce

2016-12-15 a.o.

Nantua sauce is a classical French sauce consisting of a Béchamel sauce base, cream, crawfish butter and crawfish tails. The sauce is named for the city of Nantua, which is known for its crawfish, and the term à la Nantua is used in classical French cuisine for dishes containing crawfish

CSrawfish butter is a mixture of butter and pureed crawfish. I did not have or prepare that, just incorporated it into the recipe by blending butter and crawfish into the sauce.

I added a bunch of vegetables and also gave it a Creole spicy twist, because that's what I wanted for the crawfish Étouffée that I made the sauce for.

INGREDIENTS

This is what you need for 1 quart:

1 ½ lb. peeled crawfish tails
5 tbsp. butter
2 tbsp. flour
2 cups milk
1 cup heavy cream
S&P, Creole seasoning

optional vegetables:

2 medium onions, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 green, 1 red bell pepper, chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 tbsp. dried parsley

Pic1: Nantua sauce / crawfish étouffée

Directions

Pic2: pureed crawfish + veggies
Pic3: add béchamel, crawfish
Pic4: mix and serve

Prepare Béchamel Sauce as usual:

Melt 2 tbsp. butter over medium heat.
Whisk in 2 tbsp. flour.
Sauté 2-3 minutes while stirring without browning.
Add 2 cups warm milk.
Stir into a thick sauce.
Simmer for 10-15 minutes.

Prepare the crawfish sauce:

Melt 3 tbsp. butter over medium heat.
Add onions, garlic, celery, bell peppers.
Sauté 10 minutes or until soft.
Puree this with up to half of the crawfish in a food processor into a smooth paste.

Finishing up:

Add the pureed vegetables to the béchamel.
If necessary stir in more milk. The sauce should be thick but easily pourable.
Simmer 5 minutes.
Add S&P, Creole seasoning to taste.
Stir in the remainder of the crawfish and dried parsley.
Simmer 10-15 minutes. (Pic3)
Stir in 1 cup of heavy cream.
Adjust the seasoning to taste, preferably fairly hot.
Serve over a bed of rice. Enjoy.

See also: Deming, NM gardens, animals and more and avemariasongs.org

See also: Deming, NM gardens, animals and more
and avemariasongs.org