This Is Not What Hollandaise Sauce Looks Like.

I find it very fitting that my first cooking attempt for my first blog was a complete disaster. Typical.

Plotting out my culinary endeavors at the end of the work day, I felt invincible and went straight for hollandaise, perfect to go with an eggs-benedict-style sandwich. I have never attempted this one of the five "mother sauces." I, admittedly, am not much good at any sort of emulsifying--I never know when the sauce has thickened and always get ahead of myself.

The process started out well. I only lost one of the four yolks down the sink. We were out of lemon juice ... but we had lime. Step one, wisking egg yolks with lemon (lime) juice, went well. I converted the mixing bowl and pot of water into a double boiler and finished off with the butter. Shockingly simple. I moved the "double boiler" to another burner and grabbed the cayenne pepper and salt. Salt we had. Cayenne we most certainly did not. I surveyed the other spices that start with C: coriander, chili, cumin, curry. Chili and coriander sounded and smelled promising, but I recalled an alternative suggested on an Emeril recipe: hot sauce. So I threw the salt and a couple drops of Louisiana hot sauce into the mix. It passed the initial taste test.

I turned away to work on broiling an egg. When I looked back the sauce had gone scrambled. Rookie mistake: I had left the sauce sitting on top of the hot water. I guess it really is as testy as they say. It was completely unsalvagable. It didn't end there. One broiled egg came out close to perfection. The next broke in the pan. I scorched two pieces of toast (I know, who burns toast?). And the next pieces of toast were burned on one side. (We really should get a toaster, so I don't have to toast bread in the oven). Well, I'm off to an interesting start.