What is Demi Glace?
Demi-glace is a rich, flavorful sauce that has long been a cornerstone of classic French cuisine. Known for its deep, complex flavors, demi-glace is made by reducing a mixture of brown stock (traditionally made from beef or veal bones) and Espagnole sauce, one of the five mother sauces. The result is a velvety, concentrated sauce that can elevate everything from grilled steaks to roasted vegetables, providing an intense burst of umami with every bite.
Though it may seem intimidating to prepare, demi-glace is a rewarding culinary project that offers home cooks an opportunity to take their sauce-making skills to the next level. Its versatility means it can be the base for a variety of other sauces or drizzled over a dish for added depth of flavor.
Whether you’re a seasoned chef or a home cook looking to explore classic techniques, mastering the art of demi-glace opens the door to various culinary possibilities. In this post, we’ll walk through the essentials of making demi-glace at home, offering tips, shortcuts, and creative uses for this timeless sauce.
Demi Glace History
Demi-glace has its roots in classic French cuisine, where sauces play an essential role in elevating the flavor and presentation of dishes. The term "demi-glace" itself comes from the French words "demi," meaning half, and "glace," meaning ice or glaze. It refers to the sauce’s reduction process that transforms it into a concentrated, glossy glaze.
The creation of demi-glace is closely linked to the development of French haute cuisine in the 17th and 18th centuries, mainly through the influence of French chef Antonin Carême, considered one of the founding fathers of modern French cooking. Carême revolutionized the way sauces were made, simplifying and systematizing them.
He introduced the concept of "mother sauces," from which many other sauces could be derived. Espagnole, one of these mother sauces, is the precursor to demi-glace.
Later, Auguste Escoffier, another legendary French chef, refined Carême's techniques in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, further perfecting the method of making demi-glace. Escoffier’s version was more accessible, becoming a staple in French kitchens and a foundation for many classic French dishes.
Today, demi-glace continues to be revered for its ability to enhance flavors, making it an iconic element of French gastronomy.
How to Make Demi Glace at Home
Making demi-glace at home is a rewarding process that requires time and attention to detail. Here's a step-by-step guide to crafting this rich, flavorful sauce:
1. Prepare the Brown Stock
Ingredients: Beef or veal bones (often roasted), carrots, onions, celery, garlic, herbs (bay leaves, thyme), and water.
Method: Roast the bones at 400°F (200°C) for about 45 minutes to deepen their flavor. Transfer them to a large pot, cover with cold water, add aromatics, and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and let it cook for 6–8 hours, skimming occasionally. Strain the stock, discarding solids. This creates a rich brown stock, the foundation of demi-glace.
2. Make Espagnole Sauce
Ingredients: Brown stock, butter, flour (for a roux), tomato paste, onions, carrots, and celery.
Method: In a saucepan, melt butter and stir in flour to make a roux. Cook until it turns light brown, then add diced vegetables and sauté. Stir in tomato paste, and gradually add the brown stock. Simmer for about an hour, strain, and you have Espagnole sauce.
3. Reduce the Mixture
Combine: Mix equal parts of brown stock and Espagnole sauce in a pot.
Simmer: Slowly reduce the mixture over low heat, stirring occasionally, until it thickens and coats the back of a spoon. This can take a few hours.
4. Strain and Store
Strain the demi-glace through a fine mesh sieve or cheesecloth to remove any solids. Cool it down and store in an airtight container. You can freeze portions for future use.
5. Optional: Add Finishing Touches
Some recipes call for a dash of wine or a bit of butter for added richness.
The final result is a luxurious, flavorful sauce that can be used as a base or enhancement for various dishes.
Helpful Tips
Here are some essential tips for making demi-glace at home:
1. Use High-Quality Ingredients
Start with high-quality bones, ideally veal or beef, and fresh vegetables. The better your ingredients, the richer your final sauce will be.
2. Roast the Bones for Deeper Flavor
Roasting the bones before simmering adds a rich, caramelized flavor to the stock, which enhances the overall taste of the demi-glace.
3. Simmer, Don’t Boil
Keep the stock at a gentle simmer throughout the process. Boiling can make the stock cloudy and prevent the flavors from developing properly.
4. Skim Regularly
Skim off any impurities, foam, or fat that rise to the surface while simmering to keep the stock clear and ensure a smooth texture for your demi-glace.
5. Patience is Key
Making demi-glace requires time. Simmer your stock for 6–8 hours and allow the final mixture to reduce slowly to develop its complex flavors.
6. Strain Thoroughly
Use a fine mesh sieve or cheesecloth to strain the stock and sauce. This will result in a smooth, velvety consistency.
7. Avoid Over-Seasoning Early On
Don’t add too much salt during the early stages, as the sauce reduces and concentrates the flavors. Add any seasoning toward the end, if needed.
8. Use Ice Cube Trays for Storage
Once your demi-glace is made, freeze it in ice cube trays for easy portioning. This allows you to use small amounts whenever needed.
9. Consider Adding Wine
Adding a splash of red wine or Madeira can bring additional complexity to the demi-glace during the reduction stage.
10. Consistency is Key
Demi-glace should be thick enough to coat the back of a spoon. Keep reducing until it reaches this consistency, but don’t let it burn or become too thick.
- WP Recipe Maker #32621remove
Classic Demi Glace Recipe How to make a restaurant quality demi glace at home. Course: Sauces Cuisine: French Prep Time: 45m Cook Time: 420m Total Time: 465m Servings: 1 gallon For the Brown Stock - 8 pounds veal marrow bones sawed into 2-inch pieces - 6 pounds beef marrow bones sawed into 2-inch pieces - 16 ounces tomato paste - 4 cups chopped onions - 2 cups chopped carrot - 2 cups chopped celery - 4 cups dry red wine - 1 bouquet garni - Salt and pepper - 16 quarts of water For the Espagnole Sauce - 1 gallon brown stock hot - 1 ½ cups brown roux - ¼ cup bacon fat - 2 cups chopped onions - 1 cup chopped carrots - 1 cup chopped celery - Salt - Freshly ground black pepper - ½ cup tomato puree - 1 bouquet garni For the Demi Glace - 1 gallon Espagnole sauce hot - 1 gallon brown stock hot - 1 bouquet garni To Make the Brown Stock 1) Preheat the oven to 450 degrees F. Place the bones in a roasting pan and roast for 1 hour. Remove the bones from the oven and brush with the tomato paste. 2) In a mixing bowl, combine the onions, carrots, and celery together. Lay the vegetables over the bones and return to the oven. Roast for 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and drain off any fat. 3) Place the roasting pan on the stove and deglaze the pan with the red wine, using a wooden spoon, scraping the bottom of the pan for browned particles. Put everything into a large stockpot. Add the bouquet garni and season with salt. 4) Add the water. Bring the liquid up to a boil and reduce to a simmer. Simmer the stock for 4 hours, skimming regularly. Remove from the heat and strain through a China cap or tightly meshed strainer. Yield: about 2 gallons To Make the Espagnole Sauce 1) In a stock pot, whisk the hot stock into the roux. 2) In a large sauté pan, heat the bacon fat. Add the vegetables. Season with salt and pepper. Sauté until wilted, about 5 minutes. 3) Stir the tomato puree into the vegetables and cook for about 5 minutes. 4) Add the tomato/vegetable mixture to the stock/roux mixture. 5) Add the bouquet garni and continue to simmer, skimming as needed. Season with salt and pepper. 6) Simmer the sauce for about 45 minutes. Strain the sauce through a China cap or tightly meshed strainer. Yield: 1 gallon To Make the Demi Glace 1) In a stock pot, combine the Espagnole sauce, brown stock and bouquet garni, together, over medium-high heat. 2) Bring up to a boil, reduce the heat to medium and a simmer until the liquid reduces by half, about 1 ½ hours. Skim the liquid occasionally, for impurities. Season with salt and pepper. 3) Strain through a China Cap or tightly meshed strainer.
What If You Don't Want To Prepare It From Scratch?
It has come to my attention that More Than Gourmet’s Demi-Glace Gold is no longer available, which is disappointing news for home cooks and chefs who have relied on this product for years to add depth and complexity to their dishes without having to spend hours making demi-glace from scratch.
As one of the more popular and accessible pre-made options, Demi-Glace Gold offered convenience without sacrificing too much of the rich flavor expected from a classic demi-glace. While this product will be missed, the culinary world doesn’t stop moving forward.
Several other demi-glace products on the market promise similar results, and I’ll test some of these alternatives. I’m excited to see how they compare in terms of flavor and ease of use for busy home cooks who want to elevate their dishes without the lengthy reduction process.
Stay tuned! I’ll test these products in various recipes and report back with my thoughts on the best options for replacing Demi-Glace Gold. Whether you’re looking for the closest match or something new, I’ll provide recommendations after I’ve given them a thorough try.
Chuck
This is a "rehash" of Emeril's recipe. However, if you follow Emeril's recipe, you don't get enough brown sauce to construct the finished product. The yield in this recipe is just right and also what is necessary to end up with the desired amount of finished product. Also, veal bones are very hard to acquire outside of the commercial market. Lastly, you don't have to use all the tomato paste.
I like the recipe and unlike Sokolov's process, it does not take two days to complete.
Michael Walker
This recipe is in the French tradition and developed several hundred years ago, not Emeril. The recipe is fairly basic. The reason for the veal bones and the beef bones 'is to give' you give you two different types of marrow. I like to cook mine with the knuckles. You can see both recipes work off the beef stock 'with one' reduced down with a few more spices for the Espanol and then again demi glace. Espanol is used as a base for Soups and demi glace used for sauces. That's how I use it but the notion that this recipe is a rehash Emeril Lagasse recipe, you should probably read the origins of the sauce. In fact, the rest of the four mother sauces also 'use' these recipes 'and' have been being married for so long. People have been making the sauces for so long they tend to forget why the original sauce was made to exacting standards right down to weight.
Doug
this recipe is not the standard Escoffier recipe.
You need to take the bone broth and cook been meat in it ie shank meat.
Each time, reducing the liquid to an almost glaze like consistency.
The shank meat is essentially useless after that since all the nutrients and flavors have gone into the glaze,
Nicholas Barker
What is the shelf life of this?
Kim
It says it yields one gallon, not two.
Rom
When you add 1 gallon to 1 gallon, then reduce by half... you get 1 gallon 🙂
Robert P Donlin
Making demi-glace is a long process but it's worth it. I save my bones in my freezer as I get them. As long as they are beef bones I'm happy. The reducing part is the longest part. I'll add some madiera wine to my stock as I go. You don't end up with much when you are done but you don't need a lot a make a sauce. I freeze it in small containers until I need it.
oliver
I am having trouble finding cheap organic stock bones. This recipe calls for 14lbs bones (6ish kg), prices vary from £2 per kg to over £5,JUST FOR BONES! I am looking for £1 per kg but cannot find such a price.
Richard
You can scale this recipe to a smaller quantity. A gallon of Demi a a restaurant quantity. A liter, about 1/4 whats shown in this method would work well for a home kitchen. Some folks argue that making less than a gallon results in a poorer flavor. There's no physical or rational justification for that claim and in my experience it's just not true.
Benoit
I like to use veal tail. Pretty incredible how much collagen is in one tail. Cut the final product with a knife!
Shaun
I am trying this recipe again and I am not getting a dark brown colour in my Demi glaze.it more beige or light brown What are the keys to getting a dark brown Demi glacé?
Brody
I recommend a black jack -sugar and water brought past 360 degrees carefully as water once sugar is dark and use that to colour your demi
Foster Algier
Kitchen Bouquet or even Gravy magic , Maggie.. all will add a darkening to the sauce without changing the flavor much . The way you are supposed to get the darkened color is from roasting the bones and mirepoix in the oven
Kevin
Your roux is not dark enough. You've got to cook the roux to a dark brown but not burnt stage. The bones must be roasted well also. If not lacking in these two things will shift the entire end product as stated to a light brown weak demi.
Lorrie
Yes, Kevin, this is correct. Without roasting the bones properly and cooking the roux until it is dark but not burned the proper color and flavor will not be achieved. If these two steps are not performed properly the color and flavor will be weak and the ingredients and time will be practically wasted.
Charles Gruss
One trick for natural color and flavor is to coat your onions and bones with tomato paste; the technical name in French cooking for this is "pince". This is one aspect of the procedures I do differently than the suggested manner. I coat all the bones and onions right from the start with tomato paste, the onions I quarter instead of dicing or chopping. I do this regardless when making beef stock which is the start of this process to yield demi eventually. You get natural flavor and natural coloring by adding non-traditional ingredients.
Duncan
Personally I brown the bones and the veges in high heat in the oven 180°10-15 min then 220° 5-8 min this is for the bones mostly.for the veges 180°10 min is enough.then when you put the both bone n veges in stock pot,add tomatoes paste and cook until the paste produces red colour oil(sautee the bone,veges and paste)add flour and continue to cook dill the flour starts to stick to stock pot,then add water n let boil and reduce heat simmer
Ben
The reason your Demi glacé is to light because you don’t cook your bones and vegetables long enough to get darker colors, then your Roux it’s not dark enough, you should place the roasting pan on stove-top medium high, will cover 2 burners, let it cook brown bits , darker color will give you mor color and flavored before you deglaze it with wine or water.
RT Elkin
Twelve hours cooking time provides a superior product.
Paul Deeb
Absolutely disgusting. Veal should be illegal.
Ken Mason
Good thing you didn't see what my neighbor was doing to the poor grass in his yard this morning! He was mowing it! That was disgusting! There should be a law against that!
Kev Hatchett
Veal, Spring Lamb, Suckling Pig ... mmmmmmmmmmmm tasty.
cookist
If this is being used for demi-glace the salting should only take place during the reduction phase, because any tasting that detects salt prior to reduction means the final product will come out twice as salty.
MATT
No, the reason for the dark color is the roux
Rob
If you live anywhere in the states there is probably a Hispanic part of town in your city. In that part of the city you will find a Hispanic bodega with a meat counter. I have found that they will give you the bones for free as they see no value in the bones since their clients don’t buy bones. To them the bones are trash.
They typically also have great cuts of meat. I always buy my other ingredients from them since they give me the bones for free.
David
It takes me 36 hours to make mine.
Zach
Well worth the time & effort. I used this recipe to feed a gathering of hundreds, no complaints.
Don Dickson
I used to buy my demi glace for home use from a restaurant in Chicago. Outstanding sauce. About 5+ years ago they sold out and the new restaurant no longer made it available Would you please put me on your mailing when you have completed your look at available alternatives?
Don Dickson
G. Stephen Jones
Hi Don, I'm on my last puck of More Than Gourmet's Demi-Glace Gold, so I will need to find a good alternate. I will let you know when I find one I like and compare quality to cost.