Onion Gravy with Beef Stock Cubes

Most people are making gravy with stock cubes and there is no shame in it. The problem is that following the packet gives you something that tastes of salt and very little else. Use fewer cubes than instructed, cook the onions properly, and add a couple of things to fill the gap, and a cube gravy can be genuinely good.

Ingredients

Makes about 600ml, enough for six plates

• 3 large (about 500g / 1lb 2oz) brown onions sliced 4mm thick
• 30g (1oz) butter
• 1 tbsp vegetable oil
• 2 beef stock cubes not the three the packet suggests for this volume
• 700ml (1¼ pints) boiling water
• 2 tbsp (30g) plain flour
• 1 tbsp tomato ketchup for sweetness, acid and body
• 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• ½ tsp onion granules optional, doubles down on the flavour
• black pepper

Kit

• Saucepan
• Jug
• Whisk

Method

1. Melt the butter with the oil in a saucepan over a medium low heat, add the onions with only the smallest pinch of salt and cook for 30 minutes, stirring regularly, until dark brown. Go easy on the salt at this stage, because stock cubes are going to bring a great deal of it later.

2. While they cook, crumble the two stock cubes into a jug and pour over the boiling water, stirring until they have fully dissolved. Two cubes in 700ml is weaker than the packet recommends, and that is intentional, because at packet strength salt drowns everything else.

3. Stir the flour and the onion granules into the browned onions and cook for 2 minutes, scraping the base.

4. Add the stock in three additions, whisking hard each time until smooth. It will thicken and go a proper brown as it comes to a simmer.

5. Stir in the ketchup and the Worcestershire sauce. Ketchup sounds like a joke ingredient in a gravy but it brings sugar, vinegar, tomato and a little thickness all at once, and it is exactly what a cube based gravy is missing.

6. Simmer for 12 minutes, stirring occasionally, so the flour cooks out fully and the gravy reduces slightly and deepens.

7. Taste. It will almost certainly not need salt. Grind in plenty of black pepper and, if it still tastes flat, add another half teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce rather than more salt.

Tips worth knowing

• Dissolve the cubes in a jug rather than crumbling them into the pan. Crumbled cubes leave gritty patches that never fully disperse.
• Different brands vary hugely. Some cubes are far saltier than others, so taste the made up stock before it goes into the pan and dilute further if it makes you wince.
• Stock pots and concentrated liquid stocks generally taste better than cubes for a small extra cost. Use two thirds of the recommended amount in the same way.
• A splash of the water your vegetables boiled in gives a cube gravy a bit of the body it otherwise lacks.

Keeping and reheating

Fridge for 4 days, freezer for 3 months. Cube gravies taste saltier the day after, so loosen with water rather than more stock when reheating.

Questions people ask