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Sauce

Wine Sauce

A sauce made from white wine, egg yolks, sugar, nutmeg or lemon peel, and flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Wine Sauce

Why it works: Nutmeg and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,623 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Wine Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Boil the white wine in a porcelain-lined kettle.

  2. In a bowl, beat the egg yolks with the sugar until light.

  3. Add the grated nutmeg or lemon peel and gradually mix in the flour until smooth.

  4. Slowly pour in the boiling wine while stirring constantly.

  5. Return the mixture to the kettle and stir until the spoon is coated.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Egg + nutmegtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together24,744 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. White wine + nutmegtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,659 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

Egg and flour 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the sauce and add richness as they set gently with heat.
White wine
Provides the liquid base and acidity that gives the sauce its bright flavor.
Flour
Stabilizes the sauce and helps it thicken smoothly without lumps.
White sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the acidity of the wine.

The step that matters

Return the mixture to the kettle and stir until the spoon is coated. Egg yolks thicken when gently heated but can scramble if overheated. Stirring constantly over low heat keeps the sauce smooth and lets it thicken evenly, so the spoon is coated without curdling.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Cinnamonfits about as well
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Jalapenofits about as well
  4. Tarragonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against white wine, egg, sugar, flour. 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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