The Creamy, Flavor-Packed French Sauce That Starts With A Hard-Boiled Egg

Consider gribiche as tartar sauce's French cousin, and like most things French, it arrives to the party flaunting that rich, "je ne sais quoi" quality that everybody finds alluring. Gribiche is a tangy, briny, and bright mayonnaise-based sauce that is made by using boiled egg yolks as its base. This creates sauce with a depth of flavor that is strong but not too overpowering, as a medley of other notes from herbs, capers, gherkins, mustard, and vinegar offset the eggy taste perfectly.

Though technically gribiche is not one of the five French mother sauces, it is still a classic recipe that dates back to at least a century ago. It is traditionally served with boiled meats like chicken and tête de veau (calf's head). However, using gribiche sauce is one of those cookings tips that can take various foods to the next level, including any kind of grilled meat, crispy restaurant-quality roast potatoes, fish, or asparagus. The fact that gribiche uses hard-boiled eggs instead of raw ones makes for a creamier mayonnaise base with a perfectly subtle sulphurous flavor that goes very well with all so many dishes.  

The principal ingredient that makes this sauce unique is the hard-boiled egg,  and the key to a great gribiche is mashing the yolk until it's nice and creamy. Once you've got mashed hard-boiled yolks as your base, it's time to add Dijon mustard and vinegar before slowly adding the oil in and whisking until the mixture is smooth. Chopped gherkins or cornichons are a non-negotiable ingredient in this recipe to get that kick from the brine. Additional ingredients to give your gribiche more complexity can include anchovies, red onions, capers, and chopped herbs such as tarragon and parsley. The final touch to make gribiche complete is to mix in the chopped up egg white from the hard-boiled egg. 

The key to keeping this sauce emulsified and not broken lies in getting the egg yolk, mustard, and vinegar base creamy, smooth, and lump-free. This can be done by passing the egg yolk through a sieve when mashing it in the first step, or by using a little trick and adding a raw yolk in addition to the cooked one. The extra raw yolk will not affect the flavor of the sauce too noticeably and will make it easier to achieve a creamier gribiche that's ready to be spooned over all your dishes.