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Sauce

Bacon Fat Sauce

A sauce made from bacon fat, flour, paprika, vinegar, eggs, and salt, served with greens.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Olive M. Hulse · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Bacon Fat Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Heat five tablespoonfuls of strained bacon or ham fat in a saucepan.

  2. Add two tablespoonfuls of flour and stir to a smooth paste.

  3. Add one-eighth teaspoonful of paprika and one-third cup of vinegar diluted with one cup of boiling water, stirring constantly.

  4. When the sauce begins to boil, remove to the side of the range and beat in two yolks of eggs.

  5. Add more salt if necessary.

  6. Do not allow the sauce to boil after the eggs are added.

Serve

  1. Chill thoroughly and serve with spinach or dandelion, endive or lettuce.

  2. The sauce may be thinned with cream if too thick.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

579Calories
22 gProtein
10 gFat
96 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 6 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Bacon1 slice cooked (8g)43
Vinegar1 tbsp (15ml) distilled3
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Olive M. Hulse. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures. See the original page.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + vinegartop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,652 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Vinegar + eggtop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together12,922 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Bacon fat
Provides the fat base that carries the flour and gives the sauce its savory flavour.
Flour
Thickens the fat into a paste that gives the sauce body as liquid is added.
Vinegar
Adds sharpness that balances the richness of the fat and eggs.
Eggs
Yolks enrich and thicken the sauce as they set with gentle heat.

The step that matters

Do not allow the sauce to boil after the eggs are added.. Egg yolks scramble and curdle when overheated, so the sauce turns grainy. Removing it from direct heat before beating in the yolks keeps it smooth and thickened.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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