Tips for the Restaurant Chef

In fast-paced professional kitchens, many chefs find that integral sauces require too much last-minute preparation. Roasting a chicken and preparing a jus to order is impractical in all but the most-well-staffed restaurants. Stock-based sauces were originally invented to free the cook from the last-minute difficulties inherent in preparing integral sauces. Unfortunately, stock-based sauces, especially the way they are prepared in today’s economy-oriented kitchens, rarely have the satisfying direct flavor of a well-made integral sauce. It is, however, possible to organize a kitchen so that some of the elements necessary to an integral sauce can be accomplished in advance.