🥓 Professional Kitchen · Sauces
Smoky Bacon Butter Emulsion
A deeply flavoured bacon stock, reserved smoky fat and master butter emulsion blended into one glossy restaurant sauce.
Behind the plate
This is the most involved sauce in the butter-emulsion collection. Bacon trim is rendered slowly, the vegetables are coloured in its fat, and tomato, paprika and wine build a stock with smoke, sweetness and acidity.
Chilling the strained stock overnight is an important part of the method. It lets the bacon fat set cleanly so it can be lifted, reserved and added back with control after the stock has been reduced.
Why this recipe works
Rendering separates flavourful bacon fat from the meat before the vegetables are cooked. Tomato purée and paprika caramelise for depth, wine lifts the pan, and a long simmer extracts the trim. Reuniting reduced stock, reserved fat and master emulsion produces a stable, intensely savoury sauce.
The recipe
Ingredients
- 1,000 g smoked bacon trim
- 70 g vegetable oil
- 7 g garlic, chopped
- 200 g white onions, sliced
- 135 g carrot, chopped
- 135 g leeks, washed and chopped
- 100 g mushrooms, sliced
- 20 g fresh thyme
- 165 g dry white wine
- 100 g tomato purée
- 13 g smoked paprika
- 2,000 g water
- 8 ml lemon juice
- Master butter emulsion, as needed
- Fine salt, to taste
Method
- Heat a large, heavy pan. Add the vegetable oil and bacon trim, then cook over low heat until deeply coloured and the fat has rendered.
- Remove and reserve the bacon. Leave the rendered fat in the pan, add the onions and sweat until they begin to caramelise.
- Add the garlic, carrot, leeks, mushrooms and thyme. Cook over medium heat until softened and starting to colour.
- Stir in the tomato purée and smoked paprika. Cook for 5 minutes, stirring so the purée caramelises without catching.
- Add the white wine and reduce by half. Return the bacon to the pan, add the water and simmer gently for 90 minutes.
- Strain through a fine sieve, cool rapidly and refrigerate overnight. The next day, lift off and reserve the set bacon fat.
- Reduce the chilled bacon stock until concentrated. Whisk it gradually into warm master butter emulsion, followed by enough reserved bacon fat to deepen the smoky flavour.
- Add the lemon juice and salt, then blend until smooth and glossy. Hold over gentle heat and do not boil.
Chef’s notes
- Render the bacon slowly; high heat can scorch the fat before the trim colours evenly.
- Cook the tomato purée for the full 5 minutes to remove its raw edge and develop sweetness.
- Cool the strained stock rapidly before refrigerating and follow professional time-and-temperature controls.
- Add the reserved fat gradually—the finished sauce should taste smoky and glossy, not greasy.
- If the finished emulsion starts to split, remove it from the heat and blend in a splash of cool water.
At the table
Pair with charred cabbage, roast potatoes, grilled pork, chicken or mushrooms. Use it as a concentrated finishing sauce and balance the plate with something fresh or acidic.