A Classic Mustard - Wine Sauce to Serve with Pork
Robert Sauce is another fantastic sauce with demi glace as a base ingredient. Actually it is derived from the classic French Espagnole sauce, also called brown sauce and is one of the 5 Mother Sauces.
I have seen various pronunciations for Sauce Robert but I like to use [ROH-bare]. It is made with onions, mustard, white wine and brown sauce or demi glace. It is especially good when served with pork but also works well with beef and chicken.
Making this sauce at home can take a long time if you have to prepare the brown sauce from scratch but as you have seen from my other classic French sauce recipes, I prefer to use commercial products now available on the market rather than take the hours to prepare my own.
Who Is the Robert in Sauce Robert?
A great question and still a mystery today. No one knows for sure who this sauce is named for. From my limited research on the Internet, Sauce Robert is one of the earliest “compound” sauces ever made. It has been seen in French cookbooks dating all the way back to the 1600’s .
Some sources credit Robert Vinot, a cook from late 16th century but then other sources discredit this idea. For a much more detailed history of this sauce, I suggest you read my friend Peter Hertzmann's post called Of Unknown Origin: Sauce Robert.
Robert Sauce Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 medium onion finely diced
- 2 tablespoons butter
- ½ cup dry white wine
- 1 cup demi glace
- 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
- freshly ground pepper to taste
Instructions
- Heat a saucepan over medium heat until hot.
- Add 1 tablespoon of butter to the pan. As soon as the butter melts and starts to foam, add the onions. Be careful not to let the butter burn. Cook the onions until they become translucent.
- Remove the pan from the stove and carefully add the wine to the pan. Return the pan to the stove and reduce until most of the wine is cooked off.
- Add the demi glace along with a little salt and pepper, stir and reduce until the sauce is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon.
- Add the mustard and finish by adding the remaining tablespoon of butter to the sauce and stir. This is called mounting.
- Taste and adjust seasoning with salt and pepper if needed.
- Serve with your favorite pork dishes or beef and chicken recipes.
My Top Choices for Demi Glace
Online Sources: Demi Glace
For those of you who do not want to make demi glace at home.
Demi glace is the most important ingredient for making classic "restaurant quality" brown sauces. All the great French brown sauces use demi glace. But it can also be used in soups, stews and braises. It's something you can make at home but it takes a long, long time to do it right and if you make one mistake, it can easily be ruined. Lucky for us, there are now some great sources for commercial grade demi glace and I want to share a few with you now. Everyone has their preferences so I suggest you give each a try to find out which product you like best.Savory Choice's Demi Glace
Ready in minutes, Savory Choice beef demi glace allows home chefs to deliver impressive restaurant-quality meals quickly and cost-effectively. Professional chefs typically take at least 24 hours to prepare this traditional reduction sauce by simmering stock, vegetables, wine and spices to a velvety consistency.More Than Gourmet's Demi Glace Gold
One of my first commercial demi glace products and still one of my favorites. For almost 25 years, More Than Gourmet has been the gold standard for flavor and quality when it comes to sauces, stock, and soup. This product comes in 1 pound tubs and 1.5 ounce pucks and even bigger sizes if you are a commercial establishment. I like buying 6 of the pucks at a time unless I'm doing a big party and need the pounder.
ron foster
Thanks for the info on Sauce Robert.What commercial product can be used for it and where available? Thanks.
The Reluctant Gourmet
You are welcome Ron. My favorite is Demi-glace Gold® and it is available at Amazon.