Hollandaise and Maltaise Sauce

This post focuses on hollandaise, a heart-stoppingly rich sauce that is usually made by hand, and has to be kept warm in order to hold the emulsion. An emulsion is an oil + anything that is not an oil, forced together into a blend. Think about oil and vinegar: these two things will always separate. In order to bond them, an emulsifier, like mustard or lecithin (from egg whites) is used. The most common emulsions are mayonnaise (a semi-permanent emulsion), bottled vinaigrette dressing (oil + vinegar).
For hollandaise and maltaise sauces, egg yolks are forced into a bond with wine vinegar and clarified butter. The mixture is hand whisked for about 30-40 minutes as the three ingredients are added, drop by drop. To serve the sauces, we peeled some white and green asparagus and blanched them for a few seconds.

I was tasked with working a maltaise sauce - a hollandaise base with orange reduction and orange zest instead of red wine vinegar. Below is some orange zest that I blanched.

Chef demonstrating how the color of the egg yolks changed as you whisk them.

Then he demonstrated how to drizzle the butter into the mixture drop by drop.

Meanwhile, since everyone was using the burners for round 1 of hollandaise, I was making the orange reduction at the work tables. To do this, I squeezed 6 oranges, reduced the juice in a saucepan for about 15 minutes until it became syrup, and reserved it for the maltaise.

Starting the hollandaise base for the maltaise sauce:

Meanwhile, I boiled my asparagus for a few seconds.

Chef demonstrating how to fix a broken hollandaise. It's a combination of adding heat or warm water or warming up or cooling down the bowl to get the consistency back.

Below, my finished plate with asparagus, maltaise sauce, and orange reduction droplets.

  
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Maltaise Sauce

2 lg egg yolks
 1 TB fresh lemon juice
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 c unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 tsp orange zest
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1 1/2 TB fresh orange juice, reduced by half

Whisk the egg yolks by hand and add a little orange reduction to the bowl by drops. Whip the mixture until it is pale yellow.
Place a bowl over a double-boiler or pot of boiling water. 
Whisk the mixture until it coats the back of a spoon.
Remove from double boiler and whisk in the butter, drop by drop until the yolk mixture thins out and you have fluid ribbons when you lift the whisk out of the bowl.
Add the lemon juice, cayenne pepper, salt and black pepper if needed.
Keep very warm (not hot and not cold) so the sauce doesn't separate.
Discard after 45 minutes if not used.

 Serve with vegetables or poaches eggs.

Enjoy!