Gorgonzola cream sauce question

[David M. Bueker]

So I received the Cooks Illustrated cookbook for Christmas. Love it. I'm filled to the brim with ideas from it.

Last night I made the Gorgonzola cream sauce for our whole wheat pasta. The flavor was outstanding, but it never thickened up one bit except when it cooled off. The ingredients and measures were just as specified (heavy cream, a little wine and the cheese), but even after double the noted cooking time I still had something the same thickness of the cream/wine mixture.

Any ideas where I might have gone wrong, or is it supposed to be thin?

[Robin Garr]

Heavy cream should thicken as it boils, David, but maybe ultra-pasteurization works against that in some way? If nobody was looking, I might have cheated and stirred in a little cornstarch or arrowroot.

That seems odd. I usually get fairly thick cream sauces with enough heating. Don't know what would have happened with yours.

I'm also a big fan of that cookbook. I'll be interested in your experiences with those recipes.

[David M. Bueker]

Mike - I did a chicken & bok choy stir fry recipe from the book tonight. Almost exactly right, but too salty. next time I won't use as much soy sauce as they called for.

Hmm. Not sure. I always use Ina Garten's recipe for it and it works perfectly.
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ina-garten/gorgonzola-sauce-recipe/index.html

[David M. Bueker]

Wow. Ina's recipe calls for a much longer reduction/boiling time than the Cook's Illustrated Cookbook.

I never thought of using this sauce for pasta, but I've used it to lace pork and vegetables and whenever I serve it to guests, I'm always asked for the recipe. It is nice and creamy, with just the right amount of thickness that would work well to cling to pasta. From Saveur magazine:

Bleu Cheese Sauce
1 c dry vermouth
1 3/4 c heavy cream
3-4 oz bleu cheese (good quality)
freshly ground white pepper

Bring vermouth to a boil in a saucepan over medium-high heat until reduced by half (about 7 minutes). Add cream and return to a boil. Reduce sauce by about 1/3 (about 15 minutes). Remove from heat, whisk in cheese and season with pepper. Keep warm.

I have no issue with the taste of a gorg sauce, but I do have an aesthetic issue with the visual aspect as it usually looks like unappetizing blue wall paper paste (except in David's case, where I guess it would look like unappetizing blue gruel). I always toss something a bit more scenic in there - sometimes as simple as a sprinkle of chopped parsley or even Parmesan to lighten the appearance a bit. I've also used shaved almonds or walnuts as they mate flavours well with the cheese.

David, you could always cheat and shorten the time for thickening by adding a tsp of arrowroot or cornstarch....

Could the quality/butterfat % of the cheese have something to do with it? Maybe it had a lower butterfat. Also so many of the so called heavy creams rely on thickeners rather than a higher butter fat.

[David M. Bueker]

Very high quality cheese and pure cream, so not sure what happened. Guess I will have to try making it again!