The velvety butter sauce with tarragon and a fresh vinegar reduction, the classic companion to red meat. Béarnaise has a reputation for being difficult, but if you work calmly and respect the heat, you can have it on the table in a quarter of an hour.
Béarnaise sauce
Sauce béarnaise
Béarnaise sauce
Sauce béarnaise
Method
01
Gastrique
Bring the vinegar, wine, shallot, peppercorns and tarragon stalks to the boil in a small saucepan and reduce to approx. 2 tablespoons of liquid. Strain and leave to cool slightly.
02
Sabayon
Whisk the egg yolks with the gastrique in a bowl over a bain-marie (the bowl must not touch the water) to an airy, thick ribbon; the foam should hold the trail of the whisk. This takes 3–4 minutes of patience; too hot and you have scrambled egg.
03
Mount with butter
Take the bowl off the water and whisk in the lukewarm clarified butter in a thin stream, first drop by drop, then more generously, until you have a thick, glossy sauce.
04
Season
Stir in the chopped tarragon (and chervil) and season with salt and a pinch of cayenne. Serve lukewarm.
Tips & notes
Béarnaise is a sauce of patience and low temperature: if it does split, whisk a tablespoon of lukewarm water in a clean bowl and add the split sauce to it drop by drop, whisking; usually it simply comes back. Do not keep it warmer than 60 °C and do not refrigerate it: make it last, just before serving.
Chef's tip
Béarnaise is technically a hollandaise with a tarragon-vinegar reduction instead of lemon: the same egg yolk and butter mounting, a different aroma. Once you have mastered hollandaise, béarnaise is just a matter of a different reduction beforehand.
Variations
- Sauce Choron – Béarnaise with tomato purée, soft pink in colour.
- Sauce Foyot – Béarnaise with glace de viande, deeper in flavour.
- Sauce Paloise – Béarnaise with mint instead of tarragon, for lamb.
Contains:
Eggs
Milk
Sulphites
Serve with
- Tournedos
- Chateaubriand
- Grilled entrecôte
- Frites
- Grilled monkfish
| Calories | 734 kcal |
|---|---|
| Protein | 15 g |
| Carbohydrates | 82 g |
| Fat | 48 g |
| Fibre | 32 g |
Estimated values, calculated from standard nutritional values per ingredient.
