What Are the 5 Mother Sauces of Classical Cuisine? (2024)

In the culinary arts, the term "mother sauce" refers to any one of five basic sauces, which are the starting points for making various secondary sauces or "small sauces."

They're called mother sauces because each one is like the head of its own unique family.

What Are the 5 Mother Sauces of Classical Cuisine? (1)

A sauce is essentially a liquid plus some sort of thickening agent along with other flavoring ingredients. Each of the five mother sauces is made with a different liquid, and a different thickening agent—although three of the mother sauces are thickened with ​aroux, in each case the roux is cooked for a different amount of time to produce a lighter or darker color.

Here are the five mother sauces and show examples of some of the small sauces that can be made from each mother sauce.

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Watch Now: How to Make Roux and Clarified Butter

Béchamel Sauce

What Are the 5 Mother Sauces of Classical Cuisine? (2)

Béchamel sauce is probably the simplest of the mother sauces because it doesn't require making stock. If you have milk, flour, and butter you can make a very basic béchamel.
Béchamel is made by thickening hot milk with a simple white roux. The sauce is then flavored with onion, cloves, and nutmeg and simmered until it is creamy and velvety smooth.
Béchamel can be used as an ingredient in baked pasta recipes like lasagna, and also in casseroles. But it's also the base for some of the most common white sauces, cream sauces and cheese-based sauces. Here are some of the small sauces made from béchamel:

  • Cream Sauce
  • Mornay Sauce
  • Soubise Sauce
  • Nantua Sauce
  • Cheddar Cheese Sauce
  • Mustard Cheese Sauce
  • Cheesy Sauce

Velouté Sauce

What Are the 5 Mother Sauces of Classical Cuisine? (3)

Velouté sauce is another relatively simple mother sauce, made by thickening white stock with a roux and then simmering it for a while. While the chicken velouté, made with chicken stock, is the most common type, there is also a veal velouté and fish velouté.
Each of the veloutés forms the basis of its own respective secondary mother sauce. For instance, chicken velouté fortified with cream becomes the Supreme Sauce. Veal velouté thickened with egg yolks and cream becomes the Allemande Sauce. And the fish velouté plus white wine and heavy cream becomes the White Wine Sauce.
Small sauces from velouté can be derived from the velouté directly, or from each of the three secondary sauces. For example:

  • Normandy Sauce
  • Bercy Sauce
  • Hungarian Sauce
  • Mushroom Sauce
  • Aurora Sauce
  • Poulette Sauce

Espagnole Sauce

What Are the 5 Mother Sauces of Classical Cuisine? (4)

The Espagnole sauce, also sometimes called Brown Sauce, is a slightly more complex mother sauce. Espagnole is made by thickening brown stock with a roux. So in that sense, it's similar to a velouté. The difference is that Espagnole is made with tomato purée and mirepoix for deeper color and flavor. And,the brown stock itself is made from bones that have first been roasted to add color and flavor.
Espagnole is traditionally further refined to produce a rich, deeply flavorful sauce called a demi-glace, which is itself the starting point for making the various small sauces. A demi-glace consists of a mixture of half Espagnole and half brown stock, which is then reduced by half.
For a shortcut, you could skip the demi-glace step and make the small sauces directly from the Espagnole. You'll lose some flavor and body, but you'll save time. Here are some examples of small sauces made from Espagnole:

  • Marchand de Vin Sauce (Red Wine Reduction)
  • Robert Sauce
  • Charcutière Sauce
  • Lyonnaise Sauce
  • Chasseur Sauce
  • Bercy Sauce
  • Mushroom Sauce
  • Madeira Sauce
  • Port Wine Sauce

Hollandaise Sauce

What Are the 5 Mother Sauces of Classical Cuisine? (5)

Hollandaise sauce is unlike the mother sauces we've mentioned so far, due to a liquid and a thickening agent, plus flavorings. Hollandaise is a tangy, buttery sauce made by slowly whisking clarified butter into warm egg yolks. So the liquid here is the clarified butter and the thickening agent is the egg yolks.
Hollandaise is an emulsified sauce, and we use clarified butter when making a Hollandaise because whole butter, which contains water and milk solids, can break the emulsion. Clarified butter is just pure butterfat, so it helps the emulsion remain stable.
Hollandaise sauce can be used on its own, and it's particularly delicious on seafood, vegetables, and eggs. But there are also a number of small sauces that can be made from Hollandaise:

  • Béarnaise Sauce
  • Dijon Sauce
  • Foyot Sauce
  • Choron Sauce
  • Maltaise Sauce

Classic Tomate Sauce

What Are the 5 Mother Sauces of Classical Cuisine? (6)

The fifth mother sauce is the classic Tomate sauce. This sauce resembles the traditional tomato sauce that we might use on pasta and pizza, but it's got much more flavor and requires a few more steps to make.
First, we render salt pork and then sauté aromatic vegetables. Then we add tomatoes, stock, and a ham bone, and simmer it in the oven for a couple of hours. Cooking the sauce in the oven helps heat it evenly and without scorching.
Traditionally, the tomate sauce was thickened with roux, and some chefs still prepare it this way. But the tomatoes themselves are enough to thicken the sauce. Here are a few small sauces made from the classic tomate sauce:

  • Spanish Sauce
  • Creole Sauce
  • Portuguese Sauce
  • Provençale Sauce

COOK: The 5 Steps to Becoming a Smarter, Faster, More Mindful Cook

What Are the 5 Mother Sauces of Classical Cuisine? (2024)

FAQs

What Are the 5 Mother Sauces of Classical Cuisine? ›

Read on to learn how to make each one. In the 19th century, Marie-Antoine Carême anointed Béchamel, Velouté, Espagnole

Espagnole
Espagnole sauce (French pronunciation: [ɛspaɲɔl]) is a basic brown sauce, and is one of the mother sauces of classic French cooking. In the early 19th century the chef Antonin Carême included it in his list of the basic sauces of French cooking.
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Espagnole_sauce
, and tomato sauce as the building blocks for all other sauces in his work L'Art de la Cuisine Française au Dix-Neuvième Siecle. Later on, Hollandaise got added to the family.

What are the five classical grand sauces? ›

Here are the basic formulas of the five grand or mother sauces:
  • Béchamel: Roux + dairy.
  • Velouté: Roux + white stock.
  • Espagnole: Roux + brown stock.
  • Hollandaise: Egg yolks + clarified butter + acid (like lemon juice or white wine)
  • Tomato: Roux + tomatoes.

Why do we call 5 special sauces mother sauces? ›

In the culinary arts, the term "mother sauce" refers to any one of five basic sauces, which are the starting points for making various secondary sauces or "small sauces." They're called mother sauces because each one is like the head of its own unique family.

Which chef classified the 5 mother sauces? ›

Mother sauces, first classified by French Chef Marie-Antoine Carême and later codified by Auguste Escoffier, are the starting points for countless 'daughter' sauces in French cuisine.

What is considered the 6th mother sauce? ›

(Mayonnaise, one of his essential cold sauces, is now considered the sixth mother.)

What are the original mother sauces? ›

Famous chef Marie-Antoine Carême codified the four original Mother Sauces in the early 1800s. His recipes for Velouté, Béchamel, Allemande, and Espagnole were vital to every French chef. About 100 years later, chef Auguste Escoffier reclassified Allemande as a “daughter sauce,” or variation, of velouté.

How do you remember the 5 mother sauces? ›

The best way to remember the name of each mother sauce is by the acronym BETH V: béchamel, espagnole, tomato, hollandaise, and velouté.

Is mayonnaise a mother sauce? ›

It is, unlike all other sauces, a cold sauce of oil and vinegar with egg yolk as an emulsifier. That is why mayonnaise is often not mentioned in the list of mother sauces, but it certainly belongs in the list, so here it is now.

What is a sister sauce? ›

A sauce made by adding flavoring to a basic mother sauce is a “sister” sauce.

What is roux good for? ›

Roux can be used to thicken sauces such as gravy, béchamel, velouté and cheese sauce, and dishes such as macaroni and cheese, scalloped potatoes, moussaka, and pot pie filling. Darker roux are used to flavor dishes such as gumbo or jambalaya.

What does mise en place mean? ›

Mise en place is a French kitchen phrase that means “putting in place" or “gathering.” It refers to the discipline and organization a good chef exhibits in the kitchen. To practice mise en place, a chef should have all of their ingredients and supplies prepared and organized before they begin cooking.

Are there 5 or 7 mother sauces? ›

The five French mother sauces are béchamel, velouté, espagnole, hollandaise, and tomato. Developed in the 19th century by French chef Auguste Escoffier, mother sauces serve as a starting point for a variety of delicious sauces used to complement countless dishes, including veggies, fish, meat, casseroles, and pastas.

What are the daughter sauces? ›

Daughter sauces.
  • White wine sauce. Begin with a fish Velouté, add white wine, heavy cream, and lemon juice.
  • Sauce Allemande. This sauce is based on a veal stock Velouté with the addition of a few drops of lemon juice, cream, and egg yolks.
  • Sauce Normandy. ...
  • Sauce Ravigote. ...
  • Sauce Poulette. ...
  • Supreme Sauce. ...
  • Sauce Bercy.
Feb 19, 2020

What are the 3 modern mother sauces? ›

There are three sauces we make VERY frequently when catering and running events: Veloute, Bechamel, and Hollandaise. All culinary students must become very comfortable with these three mother sauces.

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