Hollandaise
The warm emulsified mother sauce — egg yolk, butter and lemon
The odd one out: no roux, no long simmer, just an emulsion of egg yolk and warm butter held together by nerve. It takes ten minutes and cannot be made far ahead.
The two ways it fails are heat and speed. Too hot and the yolks scramble; too fast with the butter and it splits. Both are recoverable — see the notes.
Ingredients
- 3 large egg yolks
- 1 tablespoon cold water
- 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice, plus more to taste
- 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, clarified and kept warm
- Kosher salt
- A pinch of cayenne
Instructions
- Clarify the butter: melt it gently, skim the foam, and pour off the clear yellow fat, leaving the milky solids behind. Keep it warm but not hot.
- Set a heatproof bowl over a pan of barely simmering water — the water must not touch the bowl. Add the yolks, cold water and lemon juice.
- Whisk constantly until the yolks thicken to the texture of loose cream and the whisk leaves a trail, 3 to 4 minutes. If the bowl feels too hot for your hand, lift it off the heat for a moment.
- Off the heat, add the warm clarified butter a few drops at a time to begin with, whisking constantly. Once the emulsion has taken — after about a third of the butter — you can pour in a thin steady stream.
- Season with salt, cayenne and more lemon to taste. Serve within the hour, kept barely warm.
Notes
- If it splits, whisk a fresh yolk with a teaspoon of water in a clean bowl and add the broken sauce to it drop by drop.
- If it is too thick, whisk in a teaspoon of warm water.
- Hold it in a thermos or over a pan of warm (not simmering) water. It will not survive a fridge and a reheat.
- Derivatives: Béarnaise, Choron, Foyot, Maltaise, Mousseline, Noisette, Dijon.