La sauce Béarnaise

Béarnaise sauce is a sauce made of clarified butter emulsified in egg yolks and white wine vinegar and flavored with herbs. It is considered to be a "child" of the mother Hollandaise sauce, one of the five sauces in the French haute cuisine mother sauce repertoire.[1] The difference is only in their flavoring: Béarnaise uses shallot, chervil, peppercorn, and tarragon, while Hollandaise uses lemon juice or white wine. Its name is related to the province of Béarn, France.[2]

In appearance, it is light yellow and opaque, smooth and creamy.

Béarnaise is a traditional sauce for steak.[3][4]

Contents [hide]

1 History

2 Preparation

3 Derivatives of Béarnaise sauce

4 See also

5 Notes

6 References

7 External links

§History[edit]

The sauce was likely first created by the chef Collinet, the inventor of puffed potatoes (pommes de terre soufflées), and served at the 1836 opening of Le Pavillon Henri IV, a restaurant at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, not far from Paris. This assumption is supported by the fact that the restaurant was named for Henry IV of France, a gourmet himself, who was born in the Béarn region,[5] a former province now in the department of Pyrénées-Atlantiques, in southwestern France.

§Preparation[edit]

See also: Hollandaise sauce § Preparation

A Béarnaise sauce is simply clarified butter, an egg yolk, a shallot, a little tarragon vinegar. It takes years of practice for the result to be perfect. – Fernand Point [6]

Like Hollandaise sauce, there are several methods for the preparation of Béarnaise sauce. The most common preparation is a bain-marie method where a reduction of vinegar is used to acidulate the yolks. Escoffier[3] calls for a reduction of wine, vinegar, shallots, fresh chervil, fresh tarragon and crushed peppercorns (later strained out), with fresh tarragon and chervil to finish instead of lemon juice. Others are similar.[7] Alternatively, the flavorings may be added to a finished Hollandaise (sans lemon juice). Joy of Cooking[8] describes a blender preparation with the same ingredients. A faux Béarnaise can be produced by adding capers and tarragon to a Hollandaise.[9]

§Derivatives of Béarnaise sauce[edit]

Sauce Choron is a variation of béarnaise without tarragon or chervil, plus added tomato purée.[10][8] It is named after Alexandre Étienne Choron.

Sauce Foyot (a.k.a. Valois) is béarnaise with meat glaze (Glace de Viande) added.[11][8]

Sauce Colbert is Sauce Foyot with the addition of reduced white wine.[12]

Sauce Paloise is a version of béarnaise with mint substituted for tarragon.[13]

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