Jane Grigson's Fish Book - Jane Grigson [15]
250 g (8 oz) unsalted or lightly salted butter
salt, lemon juice
Boil the first three ingredients down to a tablespoon of liquid. Strain into either a pudding basin or the top pan of a double boiler. When cool, beat in the yolks. Stand the basin, or top pan, over a pan of barely simmering water. Keep the heat steady, being careful not to overheat. Now add the butter in chips, beating them in with a wooden spoon gradually. Or, and this works well, melt the butter and beat it in as if you were making mayonnaise; you can do this off the heat if you like, so long as both egg yolks and butter are warm.
When the sauce is very thick, add a final seasoning of salt and lemon juice. If you have to keep it waiting, turn it into a tepid bowl or jug or sauceboat and stand it in a pan of tepid water. Overheating at this point can curdle the best hollandaise. If at any moment you think the hollandaise is overheating, plunge the base of the bowl or pan into cold water.
Should the sauce curdle, try whisking in a tablespoon of ice cold water. If this doesn’t work, break a fresh egg, put the yolk into a clean basin and beat in the curdled sauce gradually. It doesn’t take long, so don’t give way to despair.
CAVIARE SAUCE Fold 3–4 tablespoons of pressed caviare into the finished mousseline sauce, see below. Adjust the seasoning. For the finest fish – sole, turbot, trout, really fresh bass, John Dory.
CUCUMBER HOLLANDAISE See Grilled pompano with cucumber hollandaise, p. 62.
MALTESE SAUCE Stir in the grated rind of a blood orange, and use the orange juice instead of lemon for the final seasoning. A Seville orange makes an even better flavour. Delicious with firm white fish.
MOUSSELINE SAUCE Whip up 125 ml (4 fl oz) double cream. Fold into the sauce just before serving, and readjust the seasoning. Good with a solid fish like salmon.
SAUCE TRIANON Use lemon juice (1 tablespoon) and sherry medium-dry (2 tablespoons) instead of vinegar.
SAUCE BÉARNAISE
This is a nineteenth-century sauce, invented by a chef at the Pavilion Henri IV at St Germain-en-Laye, and named for that great French king, who came from Béarn, close to the Basque country, on the Spanish border. This chef had the idea of spicing the egg and butter innocence of hollandaise with a reduction of wine, tarragon, shallot and wine vinegar, seasoned with plenty of coarsely ground black pepper, a simple addition, perhaps, but it quite changes the character of the sauce. Serve with grilled fish of fine flavour and substance – salmon, sunfish, tuna, pompano, large mackerel.
1 heaped tablespoon chopped shallot
2 tablespoons chopped tarragon and chervil
4 tablespoons tarragon vinegar
4 tablespoons white wine
good grating of black pepper
egg yolks and butter, as for hollandaise*
1 tablespoon chopped tarragon and chervil for finishing
pinch of salt
pinch of cayenne pepper
Put the shallot, tarragon and chervil, vinegar, wine and black pepper into a small pan. Boil down until about 2 tablespoons of liquid is left. Put into a large pudding basin, and when cool add the egg yolks. Continue as for hollandaise sauce. Strain, and whisk in about a tablespoon of chopped tarragon and chervil. Add salt and cayenne. Serve in a warmed sauceboat.
SAUCE CHORON This is the most famous variation of the béarnaise sauce, and is called after a Normandy chef, Choron, who came from Caen. It is usually served with grilled meat or poultry, but goes very well with fish; see Bar en croûte, p. 353.
Make a béarnaise, above. Then flavour the sauce to taste with seasoning and about 3 tablespoons of tomato purée (preferably home-made), adding it gradually. If you feel at this point that the consistency could be improved, add 2 good tablespoons of whipped cream which will make the sauce bulkier and lighter.
OTHER HOT SAUCES
SAUCE À L’AMÉRICAINE
This sauce comes, in spite of its name, from southern France. So it is important to use olive oil and garlic, and to liven the tomatoes up with sugar and black pepper, should you happen to be cooking