Mirepoix: Building flavor the French way

There are three main secrets to French cooking: butter, cream, and mirepoix.

The first two are self-explanatory. But the less-known mirepoix is subtler, it is a flavor-builder that serves as an important base for everything that is added later.

“Mirepoix really adds depth of flavor and complexity to the dish. It is that set of ingredients that you typically can't identify, but you'd notice if they weren't there,” said Bill Powell, assistant professor of food, nutrition and hospitality at Owens Community College.

Specifically — at least in classical French cuisine — mirepoix is a mixture of chopped onions, carrots, and celery.

It seems so simple, but it adds so much.

“Imagine what a stew would be like without carrots, celery, and onions,” said Jeremy Harris, executive chef at Fifi's Reprise restaurant.

“It's so foundational to everything that we do in professional cooking. Mirepoix is normally what we would consider aromatic vegetables that really form the foundation of flavor in a lot of classical French dishes,” Mr. Powell said.

But it's not just French cooking. At Fifi's, Mr. Harris uses mirepoix (mihr-pwah) as the base of all of his soups, all of his stews, all of his braises, and all of his sauces.

Restaurant owner Fifi Berry added, “It's great for deglazing a pan. It gives it a better flavor.”

“It certainly can change, depending on the chef's inclination,” Mr. Powell said.

“If you're making a fumet, a fish broth, you can leave out the carrots because you don't want any of that orange tinge coming through. You might substitute something like leeks.

“If you go back through time, even within traditional French cooking, you might find the use of shallots or something even more aromatic, like ginger,” Mr. Powell said.

Any saut ed or fresh aromatic vegetables or herbs will do. A mirepoix could be made of green peppers, mushrooms, and onion, and the New Orleans' famed Holy Trinity — green peppers, onions, and celery — is also a mirepoix. Even a Western omelet (with green peppers, onions, and ham) is technically a mirepoix, said Mr. Harris.

It is both visually appealing and sensible to dice the vegetables all the same size; that way, they will cook at the same rate and be done at the same time. But chefs differ on whether the onions should be added to the heat first and sweated for a couple of minutes.

Mr. Harris adds the ingredients all at the same time, which keeps the onions from carmelizing as they cook. But Mr. Powell said that carmelization is sometimes desired.

“Onions typically can benefit from a longer cook time to develop that sweetness. If you're not looking for a very forward flavor from the onions, they would benefit from a longer cook time,” he said.

Similarly, although the ingredients should all be diced the same size, the size of that dice can differ. Mr. Harris typically uses a brunoise, the smallest cut used by chefs with cubes about an eighth of an inch on each side. He said it looks the best and draws the most flavor out of the mirepoix.

But Mr. Powell said that if the vegetables are going to be strained out of the sauce or the soup, they do not have to be that small.

“It's going to depend very much on the dish you're making,” he said. “If you're making a beef dish that is going to cook for a long time, I might even rough chop it.

“The longer it is going to cook, the larger the chop can be.”

Contact Daniel Neman at:dneman@theblade.comor 419-724-6155.