A béarnaise sauce tinted and flavoured with tomato — the tarragon-and-shallot vinegar reduction, egg yolks and clarified butter of a béarnaise, enriched with a spoonful of thick tomato purée and, classically, no tarragon leaves to finish. The tomato turns it a soft salmon-pink and rounds the sharpness, making it a gentler, fruitier partner than plain béarnaise for grilled steak, tournedos and fish. One of the named derivatives of the warm emulsified family.
The sauce is named for Alexandre Étienne Choron, a celebrated nineteenth-century Parisian chef who ran the kitchens of the Voisin restaurant during the Siege of Paris in 1870–71 and was known for his refinements of the classical repertoire. The pairing of a béarnaise with tomato is recorded in the codified grande cuisine that followed; Escoffier lists sauce Choron as a béarnaise with tomato purée added and the chopped tarragon and chervil omitted. The attribution to Choron the man is traditional and widely repeated, though the precise moment he composed it is not documented, so the connection is best stated as the name it carries rather than a dated invention.
The colour alone sets it apart — a warm coral-pink that looks generous against dark grilled meat. On the tongue it is buttery and glossy like its parent, but the vinegar's bite is softened and there is a faint, ripe tomato sweetness underneath. It is lighter and friendlier than a full-strength béarnaise, less aniseed-forward without the tarragon leaves. The same fragility applies: kept too hot it scrambles and curdles, too cold it stiffens and dulls.
Like all warm butter emulsions it lives or dies on temperature control. The egg yolks are whisked with the acidic tarragon-vinegar reduction over gentle heat until they thicken and foam; the partly cooked yolk proteins, helped by the lecithin in the yolk, then suspend a stream of warm clarified butter as billions of tiny droplets, giving a thick, stable emulsion. The tomato purée must be a thick, well-cooked concentrate, not a watery pulp: too much free water would thin the sauce and risk splitting it. Added at the end, the tomato contributes flavour, colour and a little extra acidity that helps hold the emulsion, while the heat is kept low enough that the yolks never set.
Variations
Plain béarnaise is the parent; sauce Foyot (or Valois) enriches a béarnaise with meat glaze instead of tomato, and sauce Paloise swaps the tarragon for mint. A Choron is the classic crown for tournedos Choron, where it is spooned over filet steaks set on artichoke bottoms. Some cooks lift it with a little tomato concassé for texture; others keep a few tarragon leaves in despite the classical instruction to leave them out.
On the Palate
Where Sauce Choron sits in the French flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 4
How it's made
6 steps · 30 min active + 5 min waiting
- 110 min
Reduce white wine vinegar with chopped shallot, tarragon stalks and crushed pepper to a moist, concentrated glaze, then strain.
- 26 min
Whisk egg yolks with the cooled reduction over a pan of barely simmering water until thick and foamy.
Watch outWhisk the yolks over barely-simmering water until thick and foamy — too hot and they scramble; the thickened yolk is what will hold the butter.
- 38 min
Ladle in warm clarified butter in a thin stream, whisking constantly, until the sauce is thick and glossy.
Watch outLadle the warm butter in a thin steady stream, whisking without stop — pour too fast and the emulsion breaks into a greasy split.
- 43 min
Whisk in a spoonful of thick, well-cooked tomato purée until evenly salmon-pink.
Watch outUse a thick, well-cooked tomato concentrate, not watery pulp — too much free water thins the sauce and can split it.
- 53 min
Season with salt and a little lemon or cayenne, and keep just warm, not hot.
- 62 min
Spoon over grilled steak, tournedos or fish and serve immediately.
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