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Poivrade Sauce

A vegetable and ham sauce simmered with stock, vinegar, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 18 ingredients
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Poivrade Sauce

Why it works: Turnip and leek match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,046 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Poivrade Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Shred and wash the vegetables clean.

Make the sauce

  1. In a stewpan, combine the vegetables, ham, and butter; fry until softened but not browned.

  2. Add the vinegar and boil until reduced.

  3. Stir in the flour and then add the stock.

  4. Stir well and simmer gently for one hour.

  5. Pass the sauce through a fine sieve and it is ready for use.

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. Turnip + leektop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,046 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Shallot + leektop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together64 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).

  3. Celery + carrottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together10,173 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  4. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  5. Carrot + turniptop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,002 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Flour
Thickens the stock into a smooth, body-rich sauce as it cooks.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and is reduced by boiling.
Ham
Contributes savoury, salty flavour to the base as it fries with the vegetables.
Carrots
Add sweetness and body to the sauce as they soften during frying and simmering.
Onions
Build savoury sweetness and depth as they soften and brown lightly in butter.

The step that matters

Fry the vegetables until softened but not browned. Gentle frying softens the vegetables and releases their sugars and flavour. If they brown too far, the sauce can turn bitter and dark, so the colour and flavour of the finished sauce depend on keeping them pale.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (celery, carrot, onion, shallot, garlic, turnip, leek):

  1. Parsleyfits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against celery, carrot, onion, shallot, garlic, turnip, leek. 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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