Easy Hollandaise Sauce
Hollandaise–an indulgent butter and egg yolk sauce, for those of you new to planet Earth–is the perfect sauce to accompany a leisurely Sunday brunch you’re having at 3pm because you slept until noon and then couldn’t be bothered to do anything for several hours. No, there is no particular reason I chose this oddly specific scenario, why do you ask?
I do really enjoy experimenting with different eggs benedict variations. Of course, since I’m a vegetarian, I don’t eat the classic ham one, but it’s really an endlessly versatile format. For a really simple vegetarian breakfast, I basically just use a thick slice of tomato in place of ham. It’s good! And you’re 15% less likely to fall asleep at the table after eating it. Probably, I don’t know. I’m not a scientist. Also, if you’re having a leisurely Sunday afternoon brunch, is falling asleep at the table even a bad thing?
Hollandaise, poached egg, and tomato on a baguette. Since moving to Morocco, pretty much everything goes on a baguette. There are great French bakeries here!
When I make hollandaise, I use the blender method outlined in this recipe from Downshiftology and will never go back to doing it by hand–it’s so easy and the results are great! However, I don’t use the same amounts of ingredients as this recipe, as I personally prefer a higher ratio of egg yolk* to butter in my hollandaise.
*HOWEVER, the hot butter is what cooks the egg yolk, so if you’re adding less of it, then your egg yolks will not be as thoroughly cooked. Consuming undercooked eggs increases the risk of a salmonella infection. But really, isn’t everyone putting hollandaise on a runny poached egg? So like…same risk.
It’s really important to me to have that egg-to-butter ratio right, otherwise it just ends up tasting too much like a butter sauce and not enough like hollandaise. I also like plenty of lemon, both juice and zest, as it really helps balance the richness of the sauce.
Variation: Harissa Hollandaise Sauce
Harissa, a North African spicy pepper paste, is ubiquitous here in Morocco. Back in the States, though, it was more an ingredient that would occasionally show up in your Trader Joe’s cart to use for one recipe and then sit in the back of the fridge for two years. What, no one else?!
Well, now, I have literal bags of harissa sitting in the back of my fridge from the Habous Olive Market in Casablanca, which I’ve mentioned before I love dearly. In addition to olives and all things preserved and pickled, the market has a variety of harissa pastes heaped up into piles, ready to be scooped into bags and weighed.
I had no idea before I moved to Morocco how many varieties of harissa there are. There’s a spicy green one that has a pickle flavor to it and numerous of the more well-known red harissa, ranging from mild to coughing-fit hot. They also contain a range of additional ingredients, like cumin, coriander, and other herbs and spices.
For this recipe, I chose a medium-hot red harissa that is not heavy on spices but instead has a fairly straightforward pepper taste. I feel that its simplicity pairs well with the richness of the hollandaise and doesn’t completely overpower the lemon flavor, but still lends an extra zing.
This sauce can be used in place of regular hollandaise whenever you want to add a little zest to your eggs benedict (or eggs florentine, or any kind of variation), vegetarian breakfast, asparagus and poached egg, or daily glass of hollandaise (what? I don’t know your life!).
Recipe:
Easy Hollandaise Sauce
Ingredients
Instructions
- Add the egg yolks, mustard, lemon zest, lemon juice, and harissa (if using) to a blender. I also add a dash of salt here. Blend until smooth and combined.
- Heat the butter (microwave or stovetop) until very hot.
- Turn the blender on again and slowly pour the hot butter into the egg yolk mixture until the ingredients are smooth and combined. Taste and add additional salt if desired. Serve and consume immediately.
