Your kids will ask for broccoli!

It's not rocket science and generations have known for some time that if you want your children to eat their broccoli (or carrot or cauliflower or peas) smother the vegetable in cheese sauce!  Yeah, that's right, I said it.  Smother the vegetable in cheese sauce.  Of course, that is if your gang is not intolerant of gluten and dairy products.

Start off with a roux (a mix of fat and flour that you cook for a minute or so), add some milk and a handful of cheese.  Voilà!  La magie!  Broccoli disappears.  You've given them yours off your plate and still they want more.  Uh huh.

Below, I've broken the recipe for cheese sauce into a recipe for a white sauce and then added cheese to it.  The white sauce, prepared as below, can be served hot on cooked vegetables, fish, poultry, seafood or hard-cooked eggs.  You can add spices as you want depending on what you will be using it for (perhaps dill for eggs or seafood, for example).

White Sauce
straight outta Cooks Illustrated 1980
1 Tbsp butter
1 Tbsp all-purpose flour (I've used whole wheat also and it was fine)
1/4 tsp salt
few shakes of pepper
pinch paprika
1/2 cup milk
- measure all your ingredients and have them waiting
- in small heavy pot, melt butter
- add flour, salt, pepper and paprika.  Low heat, stir to smooth.
- gradually stir in milk, cook, stirring constantly to thick and smooth.
If you want cheese sauce, at this point throw in a handful (1/2 cup) grated cheese of your choice (medium or old cheddar recommended) and 1/8 tsp dry mustard (optional).  Stir to melted.

You can steam a head of broccoli and pour a bit of sauce over the broccoli on each plate or you can serve the broccoli with the sauce on the side if you have little dippers in the house.  You can also break up the broccoli and stir it around gently in the pot, then serve.

This sauce is also good over hot, cooked pasta or rice, although I'll be posting soon about a kick butt mac 'n cheese (maybe two).

This keeps in the fridge for a couple of days.