Sauce
A liquid, cream, or semi-solid food used to enhance other dishes.
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, texture, and visual appeal to a dish. Sauces are an essential element in cuisines all over the world, used for both sweet and savory dishes, and may be prepared and served hot, cold, or lukewarm.
- oldest_recorded_Chinese_sauce
- Jiang, a general fermented paste mentioned in the Rites of Zhou, though specific pastes like doubanjiang emerged much later
Lore & Background
The word 'sauce' is French, probably from post-classical Latin salsa, derived from classical salsus meaning 'salted'. Possibly the oldest recorded European sauce is garum, the fish sauce used by the Ancient Romans, while the Rites of Zhou mentions 'jiang', a general fermented paste—not specifically doubanjiang, which is a much later invention. Other early sauces include jiang, Chinese pastes made from fermented meat, fish, grains or beans, documented in the 3rd century BCE.
Reader's Guide
Sauces are used as accompaniments to improve the flavor of a dish, deepening existing flavors or providing complementary or contrasting tastes. Cooking and then serving a sauce with a dish (a composed sauce) is predominantly a Western, particularly French, concept. In classical French cuisine, composed sauces are particularly important and may be uncooked mixtures or cooked preparations. Several basic cooked preparations, such as stocks, demi-glace and espagnole sauce, may be preprepared and included in cooked sauces. In the early 19th century, chef Marie-Antoine Carême created an extensive list of sauces, considering four grandes sauces: espagnole, velouté, allemande, and béchamel. In the early 20th century, chef Auguste Escoffier refined this list in his Guide culinaire, establishing basic sauces including espagnole, velouté, béchamel, tomate, and hollandaise. A sauce derived from one of these mother sauces by augmenting with additional ingredients is sometimes called a daughter sauce or secondary sauce.
Did You Know?
- Sauces need a liquid component.
- A chef who specializes in making sauces is called a saucier.
- Sauces may be freshly prepared by the cook, especially in restaurants, but today many sauces are sold premade and packaged like Worcestershire sauce, HP Sauce, soy sauce or ketchup.
- Sauces for salad are called salad dressing.
Frequently Asked Questions
What exactly is Sauce?
Sauce is a liquid, creamy, or semi-solid condiment designed to be served alongside or incorporated into other dishes rather than eaten on its own.
What role does Sauce play in a dish?
Its primary function is to layer additional flavor, alter the mouthfeel, and add a visual element that makes the plate more appealing.
What is the oldest known sauce in the record?
The earliest documented example is Jiang, a broad fermented paste referenced in the Rites of Zhou; more specific pastes such as doubanjiang appeared considerably later.
Is Sauce only for savory dishes?
No—sauces appear in both sweet and savory preparations across virtually every global cuisine, and they can be served hot, cold, or at room temperature.
Why is Sauce considered essential to cooking?
It functions as a unifying element that ties ingredients together, contributing taste, body, and presentation in a way that dry seasonings alone cannot achieve.
Elsewhere in the Food universe
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