Sauces
Jus Lié
Jus lié (“thickened juice”) is roast juices and good stock, simmered and very lightly thickened with arrowroot or cornflour until clear and glossy. It is lighter than gravy and far quicker than demi-glace: about 10 minutes while the meat rests.
- Serves 4
- Makes about 400 ml
- 10 minutes while the meat rests
- No flour: arrowroot or cornflour
- French
Method
Lift the cooked meat on to a board to rest. Tilt the roasting tin and spoon off the clear fat, keeping the dark juices and sticky bits (as needed). (No roast? Make it in a small pan with a knob of butter and carry on.)
Set the tin over a medium heat on the hob (or scrape everything into a saucepan). Add the shallot (1 shallot) and cook for 2 minutes until soft.
Pour in the wine (75 ml), if using, and scrape up the browned bits. Boil until reduced by half.
Add the stock (500 ml) and thyme (1 tsp), if using, and simmer for 5 minutes. Strain into a saucepan and add any juices from the resting meat.
Mix the arrowroot or cornflour (1½ tbsp) with the cold water (2 tbsp) to a smooth, thin paste. Bring the jus to a simmer and pour in the paste in a thin stream, whisking all the time.
Arrowroot: as soon as it turns clear and glossy, take it off the heat (about 30 seconds); long boiling thins it again. Cornflour: let it bubble gently for 1 minute to cook out the starch. The jus should just coat a spoon. Too thin? Repeat with a little more paste. Too thick? Add a splash of stock.
Season (to taste) and, for extra shine, whisk in the cold butter (15 g) off the heat. Serve at once.
Tip: tap a step to tick it off as you cook.
Demi-glace, quick demi-glace or jus lié?
Three brown sauces that recipes often call for. Which one? The classic demi-glace is the traditional, old-school route: few kitchens make it this way now, but it is worth knowing because it gives sauces body, gloss, a good coating consistency and depth of flavour. Make a batch, freeze it in cubes, and a spoonful lifts any pan sauce. For a weeknight, the quick version does the same job in 30 minutes; for a roast, make a jus lié.
| Demi-glace (classic) | Quick Demi-glace | Jus Lié | |
|---|---|---|---|
| What it is | Brown stock + espagnole (brown roux, mirepoix, tomato), reduced together by half | Shop-bought stock reduced with shallot, tomato and red wine; gelatine for body | Roast juices and stock, lightly thickened with arrowroot or cornflour |
| Time | 2 days, mostly unattended | About 30 minutes | About 10 minutes |
| Texture | Thick, glossy, coats a spoon; sets to a firm jelly | Glossy, coats a spoon; sets softly | Light, clear and glossy; thinner |
| Today | The traditional, old-school route: kept by a few traditional kitchens. Most restaurants now reduce veal stock instead; most home cooks make pan sauces | The home cook’s short cut to the restaurant-style reduced stock | The everyday kitchen sauce for roasts and sautés |
| Use it for | Bordelaise, Madeira, Robert and other classic brown sauces; a batch in the freezer. Worth knowing: it gives body, gloss, a good consistency and depth | Steak and pan sauces, Diane, peppercorn sauce; any recipe that asks for demi-glace | Roast meat and poultry, chasseur, a “cordon of jus”; any recipe that asks for jus lié |
| Tip | Freeze in ice-cube trays: a spoonful lifts any pan sauce | Freeze in cubes too; check the salt | Make it in the roasting tin while the meat rests |
See also
- Gravy from the Roast — the flour-thickened British cousin
- Demi-glace (classic)
- Quick Demi-glace
- Chicken Chasseur
- Poussin Polonaise
- Pork Escalope Cordon Blue
- Cottage Pie
Chef’s notes
- When to use which: jus lié for roasts and poultry and whenever an old recipe says “jus lie” or “a cordon of jus”; quick demi-glace for steak and pan sauces; classic demi-glace when you are making a batch to freeze or a sauce such as bordelaise, Madeira or Robert.
- Arrowroot gives the clearest, glossiest finish but does not like long boiling or reheating. Cornflour is cloudier but stable and reheats well. Potato starch (Escoffier’s “fecula”) works like arrowroot.
- Escoffier’s thickened gravy used about ¾ oz of starch to a pint of stock (roughly 20 g to 570 ml), for a coating sauce. We use about half as much for a light jus; double the starch for a thicker one.
- Chicken jus lié: use chicken stock and white wine. Vegetable jus lié: soften a diced carrot and onion with the shallot and use vegetable stock and 1 teaspoon of tomato purée.
- Making it ahead without a roast: brown 300 g chicken wings or beef trimmings in a little oil first, then carry on from step 2 and strain.
Jus, jus lié and gravy
Jus is simply the juice that runs from roasting meat. Lier means to bind, so jus lié is juice that has been thickened. Escoffier listed jus de veau lié (thickened veal stock) with his basic sauces in Le Guide Culinaire (1903). In the 1907 English edition, Thickened Gravy (No. 41) is a pint of veal or poultry stock thickened with fecula (potato starch) slaked in cold water.
Because starch gives a clearer, lighter sauce than a flour roux, and in minutes rather than hours, jus lié became the everyday brown sauce of restaurant and college kitchens. That is why so many of our older recipe cards ask for “jus lie” or “demi-glace/jus lie”: either will do. British gravy is its flour-thickened cousin.
How this recipe was developed
We worked from Escoffier’s Thickened Gravy and the old college cards on this site that call for “jus lie”, and compared the roasting-tin methods of Jamie Oliver and Heston Blumenthal.
- Starch, not flour. Escoffier thickens a pint of veal or poultry stock with ¾ oz of fecula slaked in cold water; we use arrowroot or cornflour.
- Use the roasting tin. Jamie Oliver deglazes the tin and always adds the resting juices from the meat.
- Make it ahead if you like. Heston Blumenthal builds deep flavour by roasting chicken wings before simmering; we suggest browned wings when there is no roast.
Sources we compared (opened 1 November 2026):
Also consulted: Marcella Hazan and Rick Stein (we found no demi-glace or jus lié recipe of theirs to compare) and Christopher Kimball, whose America’s Test Kitchen versions are credited above.
This is an original Cookeryonline recipe written in our own words. Ingredient choices and techniques are credited above; no source text has been copied.