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Sweet Madeira Sauce
Beat well the yolks of half a dozen eggs, pour them into a lined stewpan, and stir in three tablespoonfuls of powdered sugar, the grated rind and strained juice of one lemon, and two and one-half wineglassfuls of Madeira wine. Whisk the mixture over the fire until of a thick yellow froth, then remove it and serve with as little delay as possible. On no account must the sauce boil, or the eggs will curdle.
A sabayon by another name: six yolks, sugar, lemon and Madeira whisked to a foam over gentle heat. The whole thing lives or dies on heat control.
- Never let it boilThe original says it plainly and it is the hinge of the recipe. Egg yolk proteins set well below boiling, and once they do the froth breaks into sweet scrambled egg. Whisk over a pan of barely steaming water rather than direct flame, and pull it off the heat while it is still pourable.
- WineglassfulA wineglass in period American cookbooks is about 2 fl oz, so two and a half is roughly 5 fl oz (a little over half a cup). Weigh the risk on the low side if your Madeira is a sweet one.
- Lined stewpanThat means a copper pan lined with tin — copper conducts fast and evenly, the tin keeps the acid off the copper. A stainless bowl over simmering water does the same job with less anxiety.
- Powdered sugarIn this period the term meant finely ground granulated sugar, not the cornstarch-cut confectioners' sugar sold today. Use superfine or ordinary granulated; three tablespoons is a restrained amount for six yolks.
- Which MadeiraA dry Sercial or medium Verdelho keeps the sauce from cloying against the lemon. Avoid supermarket "Madeira cooking wine," which is salted.
- DonenessThe mixture is ready when it has risen to several times its starting volume and a trail from the whisk holds for a second or two on the surface — around 160F on an instant-read thermometer, which also settles any question about the eggs.
- Serve at onceThe foam is held up by nothing but air and warm yolk, and it begins to weep within minutes. Have the pudding, fruit or sponge already plated before you start whisking.
- YieldSix yolks and 5 oz of wine give roughly 2 to 2 1/2 cups of foam once beaten — enough sauce for eight to ten desserts.
This is zabaglione wearing a dinner jacket. The Italian original is made with Marsala, and the French form of the name, sabayon, covers the same preparation; some versions reach instead for Madeira, which was a fashionable sweet wine of the nineteenth-century American table. Madeira had a particular hold in the United States and had been a fixture of East Coast entertaining since the colonial period — so a New York hotel sauce built on it would have read as familiar rather than exotic. The technique itself, whisking yolks and wine into a hot foam, is old enough that its origins are traditional rather than documented, generally traced to northern Italy, and it remains one of the few classical sauces that must be made to order and eaten standing up, so to speak.