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Sauce

Hot Egg Sauce I

A sauce thickened with cornstarch, mixed with beaten egg and sugar, then reheated and optionally flavored with sherry or lemon.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and arrowroot are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 20% of all ingredient pairs, and 1,073 recipes mention both. Both carry 1-penten-3-one, which smells fish, pungent. The science ↓

Hot Egg Sauce I

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Bring the water to a boil.

  2. Moisten the cornstarch with a little cold water, then pour it into the boiling water, stirring until clear.

  3. Remove from heat and pour into the well-beaten egg, beating continuously.

  4. Add the sugar and reheat over hot water until ready to serve.

Finish and serve

  1. If desired, add 1 teaspoon of sherry wine or lemon juice just before serving.

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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

  1. Sugar + arrowroottop 20% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together1,073 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-penten-3-one (fish, pungent).

  2. Egg + sugartop 21% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together122,807 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  3. Egg + arrowroottop 30% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together626 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg
Thickens the sauce and gives it a rich body as it sets gently with heat.
Cornstarch or arrowroot
Thickens the water into a smooth, glossy sauce that holds its body.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the sauce.

The step that matters

Pour the cooked starch into the egg while beating constantly. Adding hot liquid to egg too quickly or without constant beating can scramble the egg proteins, leaving lumps instead of a smooth sauce. Beating keeps the egg evenly dispersed as it warms, so it thickens smoothly.

Flavor stand-ins for the arrowroot

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

  1. Sweet potatobetter flavor fit
  2. Capsicumbetter flavor fit
  3. Asparagusbetter flavor fit
  4. Arrowrootthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, sugar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“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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