General knowledge · Food & drink

The French mother sauces

Codified by Carême c.1833; revised by Escoffier 1903

Food and drink — the grammar of classical French cookery

The small set of base preparations from which classical French cookery derives everything else. Marie-Antoine Carême, in the early nineteenth century, set out four grandes sauces — espagnole, velouté, béchamel and allemande — and taught that all others were their children. Auguste Escoffier, in Le Guide Culinaire of 1903, demoted allemande to a derivative of velouté and promoted two more: hollandaise and tomate. The resulting five are what every culinary school still teaches, with each spawning a family of named "daughter" sauces made by a single addition.

How to spot them

▸Carême had four; Escoffier made it five by dropping one and adding two
▸Three are thickened with a roux — white, blond and brown
▸One is an emulsion of egg yolk and butter that is famously liable to split
▸Add tarragon and shallot reduction to that emulsion and it acquires a new name
▸Named for a financier and maître d'hôtel to Louis XIV

Key facts

Milk thickened with a white roux, named after a marquis who was maître d'hôtel to Louis XIV

Béchamel — Louis de Béchameil. Add cheese and it becomes Mornay.

A pale stock thickened with a blond roux; add cream and it becomes suprême

Velouté — the word simply means velvety. Made with veal, chicken or fish stock.

Brown stock, brown roux and mirepoix; reduce it by half with more stock and it becomes demi-glace

Espagnole — the dark one, the foundation of bordelaise, chasseur and Robert.

An emulsion of egg yolk, melted butter and lemon that splits if you let it get too hot

Hollandaise. Escoffier promoted it; it is the only one of the five that is not thickened by starch.

Add a reduction of tarragon, chervil, shallot and vinegar to that same emulsion

Béarnaise — the classic accompaniment to steak, named for Béarn, birthplace of Henri IV.

Carême's fourth, a pale sauce finished with egg yolk and lemon, which Escoffier demoted to a mere derivative

Allemande, or sauce parisienne — the casualty of the 1903 revision.

Le Guide Culinaire of 1903, which fixed the list at five and reorganised the restaurant kitchen into stations (1903)

Auguste Escoffier, 'the king of chefs and the chef of kings', who also devised the brigade de cuisine.

Key ideas

The system is generative: learn five bases and a handful of additions and you can produce a hundred named sauces. It is why classical cookery could be taught, standardised and staffed by a brigade.
A roux is flour cooked in fat, and how long you cook it decides which base it can make: white for béchamel, blond for velouté, brown for espagnole. Colour is the variable, not the ingredients.

Quick-fire facts

•Carême's four grandes sauces were espagnole, velouté, béchamel and allemande
•Escoffier's five, set out in Le Guide Culinaire of 1903, are béchamel, velouté, espagnole, tomate and hollandaise
•Béchamel is named after Louis de Béchameil, Marquis de Nointel, financier and maître d'hôtel to Louis XIV
•Mornay is béchamel plus grated cheese, usually Gruyère and Parmesan
•Suprême is velouté enriched with cream; allemande is velouté finished with egg yolk
•Demi-glace is espagnole reduced with further brown stock; bordelaise adds red wine and beef marrow
•Béarnaise is hollandaise flavoured with a reduction of tarragon, shallot and vinegar, and is named for the province of Béarn
•Hollandaise is an emulsion and will break if overheated, because the egg proteins coagulate and release the butter
•Escoffier also devised the brigade de cuisine, the hierarchy of kitchen stations from chef de cuisine down to commis
•Carême, who died in 1833, also designed the elaborate sugar and pastry pièces montées and is credited with the modern toque

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Sources

Auguste Escoffier — Le Guide Culinaire
Harold McGee — On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen
Marie-Antoine Carême — L'Art de la cuisine française au dix-neuvième siècle