On Hollandaise and Sauce that is most definitely NOT Hollandaise.

I love breakfasts out with my husband on a weekend. He (invariably) has pancakes. I invariably have eggs. Most probably I will order some sort of egg with Hollandaise dish. In the last 6 or 7 years since I truly started dining out for weekend breakfasts, I have eaten probably litres and litres of Hollandaise sauce. I have discovered, during this time that there is good Hollandaise, there is great Hollandaise, there is crappy Hollandaise, and then there is sauce that is not Hollandaise at all. This last kind has a tendency also to be vile beyond belief.

This morning, for the second time in a month, I was served the latter kind. At the highly recommended Friends & Neighbours Cafe on Whyte Avenue.  The first offender was the Route 99 Diner on 99 Street.

This morning, I ordered the delightful sounding "Eggs Benedict - with a white wine Hollandaise". I could not believe it when I was presented with the exact same sick orange-looking, onion powder smelling, cornstarch-thickened-milk-looking sauce covering otherwise perfectly poached eggs.

Bearing in mind that this is the second Edmonton restaurant to do this to me in a month I was shocked. I thought, as I stared uncertainly at the gloop on my plate, "surely this is not the exact same crap as I was served at Route 99?" Sadly, it was. It tasted exactly the same as the stuff at Route 99 Diner.

While the staff at Route 99 Diner at least admitted that the crap they served came from a box ("Of course this is Hollandaise, It says so right on the box!"), the staff at Friends & Neighbours Cafe up swore and down that this sauce was not made from powder that came out of a box labelled (terribly misleadingly) "Hollandaise Sauce". They swore it was home made. I swear to you now that it was not. It could not have been. And, moreover, it had never, ever in its short, putrid life, seen even a hint of egg yolk, butter or lemon.

Restaurants of Edmonton, hear me now! Please do not advertise as Hollandaise sauce something that is most definitely not Hollandaise sauce. Advertise it as whatever you want : "Mock eggs Benedict with gross orange crud on top"...whatever. Just. Don't. Call. It. Hollandaise. For the love of God and all things good in this world!!!

For those Edmonton restaurateurs who seem to think that sauce is Hollandaise just because that's what it says on the box, here's the time-tested recipe that I have always used. Try it. Please.if you'd rather try another - just search "Hollandaise" on Epicurious.com. Seriously.

• 4 egg yolks
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• Dash of cayenne pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon dry mustard powder
• 3/4 cup hot melted (unsalted) butter
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice

Melt butter and set aside. Combine all other ingredients (except lemon juice) into blender and while blending add butter in a slow steady stream and continue to blend until thickened, about 30 seconds. Add lemon juice in a thin stream and then turn off blender. If you need to reheat this or thicken it further do so in a metal bowl over simmering water, whisking constantly.

For good Eggs Benedict and the best Hollandaise I've had in Edmonton so far (other than the stuff made at home) try Rick & Alice's Grill on 109 Street in a little strip mall off 72nd Ave (across the street from The Soup Stone).

Comments

[Ana]

I'll try this Hollandaise. It seems easy enough!

[Heat]

Mmmmm,.... Hollandaise sauce from a box.... (a la Homer Simpson)

[Pim]

Cayenne pepper? Mustard powder? Really?

I thought hollandaise sauce only has butter, yolks, and lemon juice - and some salt and pepper of course.

I've always done it by whisking egg yolks and melted butter on a bain marie, then off the heat and adding cold butter and then lemon juice, seasoning with salt and pepper as needed.

There's nothing to it, so easy I once talked a drunk friend through this process on IM. The sauce turned out quite well I heard.

cheers,
Pim

[Dawna]

Give 'em hell! There's no excuse for faux (or baux!) hollandaise. Maybe suggest to them sweetly that a nice cheese sauce would be preferable, if the fine arts of hollandaise are beyond their abilities... I'm outraged on your behalf that they insist that such a vile-smelling, evil-looking concoction is the real deal!

[Barbara]

Classic Hollandaise has nothing resembling mustard or chile in it. According to Louis Saulnier's "Le Repretoire de La Cuisine," it begins with a reduction of vinegar with mignonette pepper, then egg yolk is added, and melted butter is whisked in with a little water or cream and it is finished with lemon juice.

That said, I bet the mustard powder and cayenne taste right good in hollandaise--and I know it would taste a damned sight better than anything that started out as a powder in a box.

Down with fake hollandaise!

[clare eats]

Post a list of places that serve that crap. They could alteast "tell you"

ugh I would be so unhappy like you are

[Lyn]

Pim & Barbara,
I know there's not really supposed to be mustard powder or cayenne in Hollandaise, but it just tastes so good! You should try it! I am inherently very lazy person and hate whisking anything at all, so, although the blender may be cheating, I can't really tell the difference in end product, so I persist. Seriously, try doing it in the blender. It is so much easier.

Clare, Dawna, Ana, Heat:
I briefly toyed with the idea of having stickers made up that said something like "Boo Fake Hollandaise", and sticking them on offending menus, but thought that would be mean.

[J]

hi lyn, i feel your pain ;)

[Barbara]

I wasn't really chiding you, Lyn--I was pointing out that while I agreed with Pim that classically speaking, Hollandaise doesn't contain those ingredients, that it would still taste good with them.

Actually, very few folks start with the classical vinegar reduction anyway. Hell, we never did it that way in culinary school. It was basically egg yolks, clarified butter, lemon juice, salt and pepper.

As for the blender--that isn't cheating. If Escoffier had a blender, he would have used it.

Just because I like to make mine by hand so I can be a show off (I whip cream by hand, too--because people think it is so magical to watch) doesn't make my hollandaise better than yours.

However, I -know- that your blender hollandaise and my whisked hollandaise really -are- hollandaise unlike that trumped up powdered crapola from a box. Restaurants that serve such disgusting crud should be boycotted.

Okay, I will stop preaching from the amen corner. ;-)

[anthony]

Restaurants of Edmonton! Feel my wrath!

Actually no bad thing giving up restaurant hollandaise. As Anthony Bourdain points out, the optimum temperature that hollandaise sauce needs to be kept at is also the optimum temp for bacteria to breed.

Those looking for broader hollandaise parameters should look to bernaise.