Sauce béarnaise (2024)

FAQs

What if bearnaise is not thick enough? ›

If your béarnaise is thin and runny, transfer to a large bowl set over a pot of barely simmering water. Whisk constantly and vigorously until sauce is thickened.

Béarnaise sauce is a delicious and creamy classic French sauce that is often made from a reduction of vinegar and wine mixed with shallots, tarragon, and (sometimes) chervil and thickened with egg yolks and butter. It's typically served with meat, fish, eggs, or vegetables.

It is regarded as a "child" of hollandaise sauce. The difference is only in the flavoring: béarnaise uses shallot, black pepper, and tarragon, while hollandaise uses white pepper or a pinch of cayenne. The sauce's name derives from the province of Béarn, France. It is a traditional sauce for steak.

The best way to thicken béarnaise sauce is to add more egg yolk. The trick to avoiding having to do so, however, is slowly incorporating the melted butter into the warm egg yolk mixture, and only doing so after it has begun to foam and thicken.

Instead, make a mixture with equal parts cornflour and cold water and whisk this into your sauce. Make sure you heat the sauce once you've added the cornflour up to boiling or almost boiling because the starch in cornflour is activated by heat and this will ensure it thickens properly.

3 oz of bearnaise sauce (Timber Lodge Steakhouse) contains 270 Calories. The macronutrient breakdown is 14% carbs, 80% fat, and 6% protein. This has a relatively high calorie density, with 321 Calories per 100g.

Egg yolks, butter, and acid (like lemon juice or vinegar) are the foundation of French mother sauce hollandaise, which in turn serves as the base for endless variations. Béarnaise is the herb-and-allium version that you've probably found atop Eggs Benedict, steak and eggs, or roasted vegetables.

When does it curdle? Either your sabayon (beaten egg yolk and water) is too hot, or the butter is too hot, or you're adding the butter too fast. If the egg emulsion is too hot, the proteins in the yolks cook before they can emulsify with the oil.

Use Flour and Water

Combine 2 tablespoons flour with every 1/4 cup cold water and whisk until smooth. Add the mixture to your sauce over medium heat, and continue to stir and cook until you've reached your desired consistency.

How do you fix a runny hollandaise? Blenders tend to make runny hollandaise - it's usually because the butter was too cold and hasn't cooked the eggs enough to thicken them. To thicken a runny hollandaise, tip the mixture into a heatproof bowl set over simmering water and whisk over the heat until thickened.

What to do if the consistency of a sauce is too thin or too weak? ›

If the consistency of a sauce is too thin or the flavor too weak, adjust it by gently simmering the sauce to reduce, thicken, and concentrate the flavors. Other alternatives include adding a thickening agent, cream, a swirl of butter, or a liaison of egg yolk and cream.

The most readily available sauce-thickener is flour. For a too-thin sauce, try adding a slurry (equal parts flour and water, whisked together) or beurre manie (equal parts softened butter and flour, kneaded together to form a paste)—both are ideal thickeners for rich and creamy sauces, such as steak sauce recipes.