Cheddar Gravy for Chips

Somewhere between a cheese sauce and a gravy, this is what you want over a pile of chips at eleven at night. Evaporated milk is the secret. It is heat treated and homogenised, so it holds melted cheese in suspension far better than fresh milk does, and the sauce stays smooth even when it sits.

Ingredients

Makes about 450ml, enough to drown four portions of chips

• 30g (1oz) butter
• 25g (1oz) plain flour
• 250ml (9fl oz) hot vegetable stock
• 170g tin evaporated milk the small tin, full fat
• 1 tsp English mustard powder
• 1/2 tsp onion granules optional but it tastes right
• 150g (5oz) mature Cheddar coarsely grated, use a vegetarian one if that matters to you
• 1/2 tsp vegetarian Worcestershire sauce or a few drops of hot sauce standard Worcestershire sauce contains anchovy
• black pepper to taste

Kit

• Saucepan
• Balloon whisk
• Box grater

Method

1. Grate the cheese before you start and leave it on the board. Grated cheese melts far more evenly than a block, and pre grated bags are coated in potato starch which makes the sauce faintly chalky, so grate your own if you can.

2. Melt the butter in the saucepan over a medium heat, whisk in the flour and cook the paste for a minute until it smells like a warm biscuit. Do not let it colour, since you want the sauce pale.

3. Add the hot stock in three goes, whisking hard each time until smooth. It will seize on the first addition and loosen on the second, which is exactly what should happen.

4. Pour in the evaporated milk, whisk it through and bring it to a gentle simmer. Cook for three minutes so the flour loses its raw edge. Stir in the mustard powder and the onion granules.

5. Now turn the hob off completely, or pull the pan onto a cold ring. This is the step that decides whether your sauce is smooth or stringy. Cheddar heated past about 70C squeezes out its fat and the protein tightens into rubbery threads.

6. Add the grated Cheddar in three handfuls, whisking each one in until it has melted before adding the next. The residual heat does all the work and it takes around a minute in total.

7. Stir in the Worcestershire sauce or hot sauce and plenty of black pepper. Pour it over hot chips straight away, while it is still loose enough to run into the gaps.

Tips worth knowing

• Heat off before the cheese, every time. Boiling a cheese sauce is the single most common way to ruin it, and no amount of whisking afterwards fully repairs a broken one.
• Evaporated milk is genuinely better than fresh milk here. The processing changes the milk proteins so they hold onto melted cheese fat, which is why it stays smooth even when the sauce cools on the plate.
• Mature Cheddar has more flavour but less moisture, so it can be slightly harder to melt. A mix of two thirds mature and one third mild gives you flavour and a smoother melt.
• If it thickens too much before you serve it, whisk in a splash of hot stock rather than putting it back on the heat.

Keeping and reheating

Keeps three days in the fridge and sets almost solid. Reheat gently in a pan with a good splash of milk or stock, whisking constantly over a low heat, and stop as soon as it is pourable. Do not freeze, as cheese sauces go grainy and watery on thawing.

Questions people ask