Wooden Spoons and Spatulas

Although a whisk is usually used in professional kitchens to stir sauces, wooden spoons and spatulas are indispensable for stirring egg yolk–thickened sauces, for which it is essential to reach into the corners of the saucepan. A whisk will also generate too much hard-to-remove froth on the surface of some egg yolk–thickened sauces. For some sauces (such as crème anglaise), a wooden spoon or spatula is essential for verifying the sauce’s consistency.

Wooden spoons are also useful for stirring sauces that have not yet been strained and contain chunks of food, such as vegetables, bones, and crustacean shells, that would get caught in the wires of a whisk.