Name: Poivrade Sauce
Ingredients: 2 shalots; 1 hard-boiled egg yolk; ¼ teaspoon salt; ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper; 1 tablespoon mushroom ketchup or walnut ketchup; 1 tablespoon chili vinegar or lemon juice; melted butter (for hot sauce) or salad oil (for cold sauce)

Why it works: Mushroom and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,525 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓

Poivrade Sauce

Ingredients

2 shalots
1 hard-boiled egg yolk
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 tablespoon mushroom ketchup or walnut ketchup
1 tablespoon chili vinegar or lemon juice
melted butter (for hot sauce) or salad oil (for cold sauce)

Directions

Prepare

Chop the shalots finely.
Mash the hard-boiled egg yolk with salt and cayenne pepper, then mix in the mushroom or walnut ketchup.

Season and finish

Season with chili vinegar or lemon juice.
Adjust the consistency with melted butter if serving hot, or salad oil if serving cold.

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.

Mushroom + buttertop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together12,525 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together13,580 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together27,814 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together118,967 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Mushroom + vinegartop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,070 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-methoxy-4-methylphenol (smoky, clove).

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

What each ingredient does

Hard-boiled egg yolk: Mashed to form the body of the sauce, giving it a thick, smooth texture.
Mushroom ketchup or walnut ketchup: Adds savoury, umami depth to the sauce.
Chili vinegar or lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the sauce and balances the richness of the yolk.
Melted butter or salad oil: Adds fat and smoothness, adjusting the consistency for hot or cold service.

“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.