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Sauce

Sauce Ravigote

A savory sauce made with chili vinegar, parsley, Reading sauce, cream, tarragon, chervil, and thick white sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Tarragon and chervil match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 824 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Sauce Ravigote

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Scald the parsley, then dry and chop it very finely.

  2. Prepare the thick white sauce.

Make and serve the sauce

  1. In a bowl, mix the thick white sauce with chili vinegar, parsley, Reading sauce, cream, tarragon, chervil, salt, and pepper.

  2. Heat the sauce over boiling water (bain-marie) and serve hot.

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 + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together824 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Parsley + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  3. Parsley + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together774 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

What each ingredient does

Thick white sauce
Forms the creamy base that gives the sauce body and a smooth, thick texture.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, softening the sharp flavours of the vinegar and herbs.
Chili vinegar
Adds acidity and a sharp, spicy bite that cuts through the richness of the sauce.
Reading sauce
Contributes savoury depth and a tangy, seasoned flavour to the base.

The step that matters

Heat the sauce over boiling water (bain-marie). Heating gently over simmering water, rather than direct heat, warms the sauce evenly and prevents the cream and white sauce from scorching, curdling or separating.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, sauce, cream, tarragon, pepper, chervil):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Fennelfits about as well
  4. Marjoramfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, sauce, cream, tarragon, pepper, chervil. 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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