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Sauce

Bearnaise Sauce

A sauce made from egg yolks, olive oil, tarragon vinegar, salt, cayenne pepper, and hot water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Tarragon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,399 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Bearnaise Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Beat the egg yolks until creamy.

  2. Add the hot water and olive oil.

  3. Place the bowl in a pan of boiling water and stir until the eggs thicken.

Finish and serve

  1. Remove from heat and add the tarragon vinegar, salt, and cayenne pepper.

  2. Serve with broiled steak.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

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. Tarragon + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Tarragon + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,547 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Olive + tarragontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,323 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Olive + vinegartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,297 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  5. Olive + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,263 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Emulsify the oil and water, then thicken into a smooth sauce as they gently warm.
Olive oil
Adds fat for richness and a silky body once emulsified into the yolks.
Hot water
Adds moisture that loosens the yolks so the oil blends in evenly.
Tarragon vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the sauce and balances the richness of the fat.

The step that matters

Thickening the eggs over boiling water. Egg yolk proteins thicken with gentle heat but scramble if they get too hot. Stir constantly and keep the bowl over simmering rather than rolling water so the sauce becomes smooth instead of grainy.

Swap the tarragon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, olive, vinegar, pepper):

  1. Tarragonthe original
  2. Parsleyfits about as well
  3. Dillfits about as well
  4. Garlicfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, olive, vinegar, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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