Hollandaise and Béarnaise

Appears in
Professional Cooking
Professional Cooking

By Wayne Gisslen

Published 2014

  • About
Hollandaise is considered an egg-thickened sauce, but the egg doesn’t thicken by coagulation as it does in a liaison or in a custard sauce. Instead, it works by emulsification.

An emulsion is a uniform mixture of two unmixable liquids. In the case of hollandaise, the two liquids are melted butter and water (including the water in the lemon juice or the vinegar reduction). The two stay mixed and thick because the butter is beaten into tiny droplets and the egg yolks hold the droplets apart. You will encounter emulsion again when you prepare mayonnaise and other salad dressings.