Classic Béarnaise Sauce Burger
A French-inspired beef burger with béarnaise sauce made from butter, egg yolks, tarragon, and white wine vinegar.
- Prep
- 25min
- Cook
- 20min
- Total
- 45min
- Serves
- 4
- Calories
- 920per serving, est.
By Time for Burgers, updated
Béarnaise is an emulsion, like a warm mayonnaise: melted butter whisked slowly into egg yolks that have been thickened over gentle heat with a reduction of white wine, vinegar and shallot. The tarragon goes in at the end, which keeps it green and fragrant. Make the sauce before the burgers and keep it warm, not hot, while the patties cook.
Heat is where béarnaise goes wrong. The water under the bowl should barely simmer, and the bowl shouldn't touch it. Too hot and the yolks scramble; add the butter too fast and the sauce splits.
Classic Béarnaise Sauce Burger
Prep 25 min, cook 20 min, total 45 min. About 920 calories per serving.
timeforburgers.com/recipes/classic-bearnaise-sauce-burger
Serves 4.
Ingredients
Instructions
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Make the béarnaise sauce: In a small saucepan, combine 2 tbsp white wine vinegar, 2 tbsp white wine, and minced shallots. Simmer over medium heat until reduced by about half. Strain and let cool slightly.
Melt 4 oz butter in a small saucepan and keep warm. In a heatproof bowl set over a pot of barely simmering water, whisk egg yolks with the reduced vinegar mixture. Whisk constantly until mixture thickens slightly, about 2-3 minutes.
Very slowly drizzle in the melted butter while whisking constantly until sauce is thick and emulsified. Remove from heat, stir in ½ oz chopped tarragon, 1 tbsp lemon juice, and season with salt, white pepper, and cayenne. Keep warm.
Form ground beef into 4 equal patties, about ¾ inch thick. Season both sides generously with salt and pepper.
Heat 2 tbsp vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Cook patties for 4-5 minutes per side, until an instant-read thermometer in the center of a patty reads 160°F (71°C).
Toast buns cut-side down in the same skillet until golden.
Assemble burgers: Place lettuce on bottom buns, add beef patties, top with tomato slices, then generously spoon béarnaise sauce over everything. Crown with top buns.
Tips
- Reduce the vinegar, wine and shallots to about 2 tablespoons (30 ml). More liquid makes a thin, sharp sauce; much less and the yolks have little to thicken with.
- If the sauce splits, put a tablespoon of warm water in a clean bowl and slowly whisk the broken sauce into it, a spoonful at a time.
- Keep the melted butter warm, not sizzling. Very hot butter cooks the yolks at the edge of the bowl.
- Hold the finished sauce over warm water off the heat, or in a warmed thermos, while the patties cook. Direct heat will break it.
Substitutions
- Dried tarragon instead of fresh: use about 1 teaspoon (5 ml) and stir it into the yolks with the strained reduction so it has time to soften.
- Clarified butter or ghee instead of plain melted butter: a more stable emulsion with a slightly nuttier taste.
- Alcohol-free: replace the wine with more white wine vinegar plus an equal splash of water.
- Gluten-free: use a gluten-free bun; the sauce contains no flour.
Make ahead & storage
Béarnaise doesn't keep well: serve it within an hour, and discard any that has sat out longer than 2 hours. Cooked patties keep 3 to 4 days in the fridge; reheat to 165°F (74°C) and make fresh sauce.
