# Using chicken fat to make a roux.



## neworleanscookj (Nov 22, 2015)

Hey ya'll, I made a roast chicken a few nights ago and saved the drippings from the roasting pan and refrigerated them. The fat separated to the top and the jus settled. My question is if I can use the fat to make a roux for a chicken veloute. My intended application is for a chicken soup with the leftover now diced chicken but I'm open to other ideas.

A few notes and side questions:

*The roasting pan was filled with thick sliced onions, shallot, crushed garlic, a few cloves and whole peppercorns, one crushed star anise and a whole dried arbor chili; salted lightly and lightly tossed with olive oil.

*The chicken was roasted spatchcocked, brined (Salt, sugar, soy.) and was the skin was basted with a mixture of melted butter and rendered chicken fat from the excess trim fat and skin.

*Skin was lightly seasoned with S&P, and paprika and granulated garlic closer to the end.

*I have chicken stock, but I'm wondering after I remove the fat from the drippings, should I incorporate the jus as all or part of the liquid(The drippings were highly flavorful when I tasted it before cooling).

*If I do use the jus, should I skip sweating onions, shallot , garlic, bell pepper and aromatics and spices as a flavor base?

Thanks in advance, I have not made veloute before and probably would not be planning on doing this today if I didn't have leftover chicken and separated jus, so I'm not sure if I should play it safe with the butter based roux with store bought stock or with these leftover components that are very flavorful. I guess if I really wanted I could do both, but I'd aggravate my housemates if I was holding up the kitchen all day experimenting on their day off. I could hear it now, "What's wrong with da Campbell's in da pantry?!"/img/vbsmilies/smilies/lol.gif. Anyways thanks in advance. Josh.


----------



## chefwriter (Oct 31, 2012)

By all means follow your instincts and use the jus and chicken fat. Veloute is stock thickened with roux. You have both and some extra stock if the sauce isn't plentiful enough.

Don't skip the sweating. While the jus may be flavorful on its' own, sweating will provide an additional boost of flavor.

The jus is chicken stock in reduced form. Home made stock is always better than store bought.

So in this case, you are sort of doing things in reverse. If you used only the store bought stock and butter based roux, you would have a classic veloute but be wondering how to improve the taste.  A straight veloute is a general vehicle for making derivative sauces, not intended to have a strong character of it's own until incorporated into a particular dish.

In this case you have the flavors from a particular dish first, then using those to make the veloute. I suspect your soup will taste great and should go far in shutting up your roommates.


----------



## brianshaw (Dec 18, 2010)

I don't want to talk you out of your plans, which should work just fine, but what comes to mind immediately is to use that flavorful chicken fat to make NY Jewish chopped liver!


----------



## neworleanscookj (Nov 22, 2015)

@chefwriter Thanks for the tips /img/vbsmilies/smilies/thumb.gif. I ended up using the jus to make a stock. I sautéed onions and bell peppers and chilies with Indian spices and seasonings in the fat, boiled red lentils in the stock, browned the diced chicken in more fat, through most of it together and reduced the remaining stock to concentrate the flavors and added it when it was thick from the lentil starch. Finished with cilantro and a drizzle of ghee, and called it lunch.

I had enough of the flavored fat to make a veloute if needed but the consistency was au point as it were. Not anything near what I had planned, but when the flavor of the star anise and clove with quite a bit of heat was detected in the fat and jus; I just said "How about French/Indian fusion?" worked well /img/vbsmilies/smilies/rollsmile.gif, still wanna try a classic veloute soon, probably for chicken and dumplings sometime this week.

@BrianShaw What does that dish comprise of? I haven't really had a liver dish in my life except for fried chicken livers, and that was a snack at best lol. Also is there some sort of stigma with some people using rendered chicken fat? It seemed to gross my housemates out that I was using it to cook with, yet dirty rice with turkey giblet gravy is fine /img/vbsmilies/smilies/confused.gif. I usually use it in conjunction mixed with butter and olive oil when brushing a roast chicken's skin; rendered from trimmed fat and skin during fabrication. They are slightly less put off with lard but not tallow. In my mind these rendered fats are obvious flavor boosters to the final dish, unless your using extra virgin olive oil as your oil, and even then I'd probably use both.


----------



## brianshaw (Dec 18, 2010)

http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/the-zimmern-familys-chopped-chicken-liver

BTW, my family gets qweazy about using fat like that... But it's great flavor and a real shame to waste.


----------



## chefross (May 5, 2010)

BrianShaw said:


> http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/the-zimmern-familys-chopped-chicken-liver
> 
> BTW, my family gets qweazy about using fat like that... But it's great flavor and a real shame to waste.


That recipe would make my grandmother twist and turn in her grave.

Food processor? OMG.

The best chopped liver is made in a wooden bowl with a Mezzaluna by hand.


----------



## kuan (Jun 11, 2001)

If you make a brown roux it will taste like fried chicken.  That's good or bad depending on your point of view.


----------

