Bordelaise sauce is a classic French

sauce In cooking, a sauce is a liquid, cream, or semi-solid food, served on or used in preparing other foods. Most sauces are not normally consumed by themselves; they add flavor, moisture, and visual appeal to a dish. ''Sauce'' is a French wor ...

named after the

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( , ; Gascon oc, Bordèu ; eu, Bordele; it, Bordò; es, Burdeos) is a port city on the river Garonne in the Gironde department, Southwestern France. It is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the prefect ...

region of France, which is famous for its

wine Wine is an alcoholic drink typically made from fermented grapes. Yeast consumes the sugar in the grapes and converts it to ethanol and carbon dioxide, releasing heat in the process. Different varieties of grapes and strains of yeasts are m ...

. The sauce is made with dry red wine, bone marrow, butter,

shallots The shallot is a botanical variety (a cultivar) of the onion. Until 2010, the (French red) shallot was classified as a separate species, ''Allium ascalonicum''. The taxon was synonymized with '' Allium cepa'' (the common onion) in 2010, as th ...

and sauce

demi-glace Demi-glace (, 'half glaze') is a rich brown sauce in French cuisine used by itself or as a base for other sauces. The term comes from the French word ''glace'', which, when used in reference to a sauce, means "icing" or "glaze." It is tradition ...

. ''Sauce marchand de vin'' ("wine-merchant's sauce") is a similar designation. Traditionally, bordelaise sauce is served with grilled beef or steak, though it can also be served with other meats that pair well with red wine demi-glace–based sauces.

New Orleans bordelaise

A bordelaise sauce in traditional

New Orleans New Orleans ( , ,New Orleans

-style

Louisiana Creole cuisine Louisiana Creole cuisine (french: cuisine créole, lou, manjé kréyòl, es, cocina criolla) is a style of cooking originating in Louisiana, United States, which blends West African, French, Spanish, and Amerindian influences, as well as in ...

is different from the French classical version, although both are available in the city. The basic flavor is garlic rather than red wine and bone marrow. Another sauce called "bordelaise" in New Orleans consists of

butter Butter is a dairy product made from the fat and protein components of churned cream. It is a semi-solid emulsion at room temperature, consisting of approximately 80% butterfat. It is used at room temperature as a spread, melted as a condimen ...

, olive oil, shallots, parsley and garlic. This combination is the foundation of the classic '' escargots bordelaises'', a dish that was available in New Orleans restaurants early in the twentieth century. The association of bordelaise with garlic may have begun with this dish and then shifted to the demi-glace version. A 1904 Creole recipe calls for garlic and parsley in addition to green onions, red wine, beef marrow and " Spanish sauce".Eustis, Celestine. ''Cooking in Old Creole Days'', p. 35. R.H. Russell, 1904.

References

{{portal bar, Food Brown sauces French sauces