Bearnaise sauce substitutes

Softened butter mashed with chopped tarragon, finely minced shallot, white wine vinegar, salt and pepper, then chilled and sliced.

Best for

steak, grilled fish, roast chicken, asparagus, steamed potatoes, burgers

The best swap by a wide margin for a home cook, and the one most steak houses would not be ashamed of. It carries every flavour bearnaise has, butter, tarragon, shallot and vinegar, and it cannot split because there is no emulsion to break. What changes is the presentation and mouthfeel: bearnaise is thick, pale and clings to the meat, while melted compound butter runs clear and pools on the plate. That means less of it stays on each bite, so be generous. Let the butter sit at room temperature for ten minutes before mashing or the shallot will not distribute.

Hollandaise sauce, made from scratch or from a good packet, finished with a reduction of shallot, tarragon and white wine vinegar.

Best for

steak, eggs Benedict variations, fish, asparagus, chateaubriand

This is not really a substitute so much as the definition: bearnaise is hollandaise whose lemon is replaced by a tarragon and shallot vinegar reduction. Simmer a minced shallot with two tablespoons of white wine vinegar, a tablespoon of white wine and a few tarragon stems until reduced to about a tablespoon, strain, and whisk it into hollandaise with a handful of chopped fresh tarragon. If you use a packet hollandaise the sauce will be a little more uniform and slightly starchier than a whisked one, but with the reduction added most people would not question it.

Good mayonnaise loosened with a little water, stirred with chopped tarragon, minced shallot, vinegar and Dijon, warmed very gently.

Best for

steak, chicken, fish, roast vegetables, sandwiches, chips

Mayonnaise is an egg yolk and oil emulsion, so structurally it is a cousin of bearnaise, and this shortcut is more convincing than it sounds. It tastes slightly sweeter and more neutral because it is made with oil rather than butter, so it lacks the nutty richness butter gives, and it is cold-set rather than warm, so it feels a bit heavier on the tongue. Warm it in a bowl over hot water, never in a pan or a microwave, and stop well before it steams or it will split. A tablespoon of melted butter stirred in at the end closes most of the flavour gap.

The same ingredients as classical bearnaise, but with hot melted butter drizzled into egg yolks and the reduction in a running blender.

Best for

steak, fish, asparagus, eggs, any recipe calling for bearnaise

If what you actually want is bearnaise and you were only looking for a substitute because the classical method sounded frightening, use this instead. Blend two yolks with the strained tarragon vinegar reduction, then pour in half a cup of very hot melted butter in a thin stream with the motor running. It emulsifies almost every time. The texture is slightly lighter and foamier than a hand-whisked sauce and it will not hold as long, so make it in the last five minutes before serving.

Shallot softened in the steak pan, deglazed with white wine and vinegar, then finished with cream, Dijon and tarragon.

Best for

steak, pork chops, chicken, salmon

Not an emulsion at all, which is exactly why it is useful: cream sauces are stable, forgiving and can be made in the pan the meat came out of, so they pick up the browned bits bearnaise never touches. It tastes meatier and less purely buttery, and the mustard gives a warmer heat than the sharp vinegar bite of bearnaise. It is also thinner and glossier rather than thick and mousse-like. Use a tablespoon of vinegar so the acid is still present, or it will taste heavy.

Not a substitute for the sauce but for the herb inside it, when tarragon is unavailable.

Best for

bearnaise, compound butter, hollandaise variations, fish

Worth including because the herb, not the technique, is what most people are actually missing. Chervil is the closest, sharing tarragon's faint anise character but much more delicately, so use around half again as much and expect a gentler, prettier sauce. Fresh basil plus a pinch of fennel seed crushed into the vinegar reduction is a surprisingly good stand-in and lands sweeter and more Mediterranean. Dried tarragon works at a third of the fresh quantity, added to the reduction rather than at the end, but it tastes dusty and flat by comparison. Avoid dill, which pulls the sauce toward Scandinavian fish rather than French steak.