No. 591

Swedish Apple Sauce

Sauce aux Pommes Suedoise

Cut five or six apples into four quarters, peel and cook them in a little white wine, reduce all of their moisture, then press them through a sieve. Place this puree in a bowl and mix in with it about an equal quantity of finely chopped horseradish, thicken this preparation with a few spoonfuls of mayonnaise (No. 606). This sauce is excellent for roast geese or roast pork, as well as for cold meats.

← No. 590 Apple Sauce for Gourmets, Apple Sauce with H Cold Sauces No. 592 Boar Sauce →

For the Modern Kitchen

A cold horseradish-apple sauce bound with mayonnaise, meant for goose, pork and cold cuts. The whole thing hinges on the proportion of horseradish, which as written is far more assertive than most modern palates expect.

The equal-quantity problemAn equal volume of chopped horseradish to apple puree gives a sauce that is mostly heat. Start at a quarter to a third horseradish by volume, taste, and build from there; the apple is meant to carry the horseradish, not merely dilute it.
ApplesThe recipe does not specify a variety, and apples of the period were generally smaller than today's supermarket fruit. Use four large tart apples such as Granny Smith or Bramley, which break down readily and keep enough acidity to stand up to the horseradish. Sweet varieties make the sauce cloying.
Cooking them downThe original gives no quantity for the wine; half a cup is a reasonable working amount for that much fruit. Cook covered until collapsed, then uncover and drive off the moisture until the puree mounds on the spoon; a wet puree will slacken the mayonnaise and the sauce will weep.
Sieve or blenderPressing through a sieve is what produces the fine texture Ranhofer wanted. A food mill on the fine plate does the same work; a blender will do, though the result is glossier and slightly gluey.
HorseradishFresh root, grated fine, is what is intended. Prepared horseradish from a jar works but is packed in vinegar, so drain it well. Grate fresh root in a ventilated spot and use it promptly, as its heat begins to fade soon after grating.
Mayonnaise and raw eggNo. 606 is a hand-made mayonnaise with raw yolks, and this sauce is never heated afterward. Use pasteurized eggs or a good commercial mayonnaise if serving anyone elderly, pregnant, very young or immunocompromised.
Temperature and timingFold the mayonnaise in only when the apple puree is completely cold, or it will break. 'A few spoonfuls' is left to the cook; three or four tablespoons to two cups of puree is a reasonable reading.
Yield and keepingRoughly two and a half cups, enough for eight to ten servings alongside a roast. Refrigerate and use within two days; the horseradish loses its bite quickly and the mayonnaise limits its life.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894) recorded the repertoire of Delmonico's in New York, and its cold sauce chapter is a catalogue of the fashionable European garnishes a grand American restaurant was expected to produce on demand. Apple and horseradish together belong to a broad northern and central European tradition — the Austrian Apfelkren is the best-known survivor, and versions turn up across Scandinavia and Germany — usually served with boiled beef, goose or pork. The "Suedoise" label in nineteenth-century French kitchens is often said to have been applied loosely to preparations thought Nordic in character, much as "à la russe" or "à la polonaise" were used, though apple-and-horseradish condiments are genuinely Swedish as well as Austrian and German. Its placement among the cold sauces reflects the era's enormous appetite for cold buffets and remounted roasts, where a sharp fruit sauce did the work that gravy did when the meat was hot.