Caramelised Onion Gravy for the Christmas Roast

1. Melt the butter in a wide saucepan over medium heat, or spoon in two tablespoons of the skimmed fat from the roasting tin.
2. Scatter in the flour and stir it into the fat. Keep stirring for 2 minutes, until the paste smells biscuity rather than of raw flour.
3. Pour in a quarter of the hot stock and beat it hard with a whisk until the mixture is smooth again before you add any more. This is the step that decides whether the gravy is lumpy.
4. Add the rest of the stock in three goes, whisking each one in fully. Bring it to a simmer.
5. Stir in the caramelised onions and simmer gently for 8 minutes, so the onion sweetness spreads through the whole pan rather than sitting in threads.
6. Skim the resting juices from the roast and pour the dark liquid underneath the fat into the gravy. Simmer for 2 minutes more.
7. Take the pan off the heat. Only now stir in the mustard, and the balsamic if you are using it.
8. Taste and season. Stock and pan juices are both salty already, so pepper first and salt last.
9. Pour it through a sieve into a warmed jug if you want it smooth, or leave it as it is if you want the onion in it.

Why the mustard goes in off the heat

The heat in hot English mustard is not stable. It is created by an enzyme reaction when the mustard is mixed with liquid, and prolonged cooking destroys both the enzyme and the volatile compounds it makes. Boil a teaspoon of Spitfire into the pan at step five and you get colour and a faint bitterness, and none of the sharpness you added it for. Off the heat, at the end, it stays a clean spike behind the onion. The same rule applies to the balsamic: half a teaspoon at the end lifts the whole jug, while the same amount boiled for 10 minutes just tastes of vinegar.

Questions we get asked

Can you make gravy without meat juices?

Yes, and this recipe is built to work either way. Without a roast, use a good vegetable or mushroom stock, keep the butter rather than pan fat, and add a teaspoon of soy sauce with the stock for the dark colour and savoury weight the meat would have brought. A tablespoon of Bill's Ploughman's in place of one of the onions gives it a sharper edge, which suits sausages, a nut roast or a vegetable pie.

How do you fix lumpy gravy?

Push it through a fine sieve into a clean pan and press the lumps against the mesh with the back of a ladle. That fixes it completely and takes a minute. A stick blender works too, but only in short bursts, because over-blending a flour-thickened gravy makes it gluey. The reason it happened is almost always the first splash of stock going in too fast, so next time add a quarter and whisk it smooth before the rest.

Can gravy be made the day before?

Yes, and it is one of the better things to move off Christmas morning. Make it to the end of step five, cool it quickly and keep it covered in the fridge for up to three days. It will set to a soft jelly, which is normal. Reheat it gently, whisking, and loosen it with a little more stock rather than water so you are not diluting the seasoning. Add the pan juices, the mustard and the final seasoning on the day.

What we sell, and what we do not

We sell the jar, not the roast. There is no ham, no turkey and no centrepiece here, so this recipe is written to sit beside whatever you have organised elsewhere. The rest of the trimmings are the same idea: our cranberry and panko stuffing is the other half of the plate, and both are the sort of job worth doing the day before.

TGK Caroline's Caramelised Onions is $16.95 for 360g, and the rest of that Tasmanian range is on the Tasmanian Gourmet Kitchen page, alongside our gourmet condiments and sauces and mixes shelves and the festive entertaining essentials that go on the same table. Shipping is free Australia-wide on orders over $100. Orders placed before 12pm on a weekday are dispatched the same day from our Corio, VIC warehouse, tracked with Australia Post.