Chef Thomas
Anchovy Sauce
A proper white sauce sharpened with pounded anchovy, the old Georgian trick for waking up a piece of poached fish or a slice of roast lamb on a Sunday in spring.
Culinary Explorer
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Marie Rose Sauce
Created by Chef Thomas
The pale pink sauce of prawn cocktails and Sunday teas, made in the time it takes to put the kettle on, and quietly better than anything that comes in a jar.
Sauces & Condiments
British
Dinner Party
5 min
Active Time
0 min cook•5 min total
YieldAbout 200ml, enough for 4
There's a particular kind of evening this sauce belongs to. Late spring, maybe early summer, when the days have stretched out and you've got people coming round and you can't quite face cooking anything that needs your attention. Cold prawns. A wedge of lemon. A bowl of this on the table. Bread and butter. Done.
Marie Rose has been laughed at for years now, dismissed as a relic from the prawn cocktail era, all hostess trolleys and avocados in glass coupes. I've never quite understood the sneering. It's a good sauce. It takes thirty seconds. It makes prawns taste more like prawns and turns a tired iceberg lettuce into something worth eating. We're only making dinner.
The trick, if there is one, is balance. Too much ketchup and it slides into something cloying and childish. Too little and you've just got pink mayonnaise. A drop of Worcestershire pulls it savoury. A pinch of cayenne keeps it interesting. A splash of brandy if you're feeling generous, which is the version my mother made and the version I still come back to.
I wrote it down in the notebook years ago, on a page also containing a shopping list and a phone number I no longer recognise. "Mayo, ketchup, Worcs, brandy, lemon, cayenne. Don't muck about with it." That's still the recipe.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
good mayonnaise
Quantity
150g
tomato ketchup
Quantity
3 tablespoons
Worcestershire sauce
Quantity
1 teaspoon
brandy or whisky (optional)
Quantity
1 teaspoon
lemon juice
Quantity
squeeze
cayenne pepper
Quantity
pinch
fine sea salt
Quantity
to taste
white pepper
Quantity
to taste
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| good mayonnaise | 150g |
| tomato ketchup | 3 tablespoons |
| Worcestershire sauce | 1 teaspoon |
| brandy or whisky (optional) | 1 teaspoon |
| lemon juice | squeeze |
| cayenne pepper | pinch |
| fine sea salt | to taste |
| white pepper | to taste |
Equipment Needed
- •Small mixing bowl
- •Spoon or small whisk
Instructions
- 1
Combine the base
Spoon the mayonnaise into a small bowl. Add the ketchup and stir gently with a spoon. The colour should turn from white to a soft, pale coral. Not lipstick pink. Not orange. Somewhere in between, the colour of the inside of a seashell.
Use a proper mayonnaise. Homemade if you've got the patience, a good jarred one if not. The cheap stuff is too sweet and too thin and the sauce will taste of it. - 2
Add the savoury notes
Add the Worcestershire sauce and the brandy if you're using it. Squeeze in a bit of lemon. Just enough to brighten things, not enough to taste of lemon. Add a pinch of cayenne. This is where the sauce stops tasting like ketchup mixed with mayo and starts tasting like itself.
- 3
Season and rest
Season with salt and white pepper. Taste it. It should be cool, savoury, faintly tangy, with a quiet warmth from the cayenne at the back of the throat. Adjust until it makes you want another spoonful. Cover and put it in the fridge for ten minutes if you've got them. The flavours settle and find each other.
If it tastes flat, it almost always wants more salt or another drop of Worcestershire. Resist the urge to add more ketchup. Sweetness is not what's missing.
Chef Tips
- •The mayonnaise is the foundation, so use one you'd happily eat on its own. A good jarred mayo with proper egg yolks is fine. Anything labelled 'lite' or 'reduced fat' is not. The sauce needs the body and richness of the real thing or it will taste like a salad dressing.
- •Brandy is the traditional addition and worth including if you've got a bottle in the cupboard. Whisky works too, in a pinch. It adds a faint warmth and stops the sauce tasting too sweet. If you don't drink, leave it out. The sauce doesn't suffer.
- •Beyond prawns, this is the sauce you want with cold leftover salmon, with a fish finger sandwich on a Saturday afternoon, with chips after the pub, with a soft-boiled egg cut in half. It quietly improves things you didn't know needed improving.
- •Make it at least ten minutes before you serve it. The ketchup needs time to lose its raw edge and let the Worcestershire and cayenne come forward. An hour is better. Overnight is fine.
Advance Preparation
- •The sauce can be made up to three days ahead and kept covered in the fridge. The flavours improve after a few hours and hold steady for a couple of days before the lemon starts to fade.
- •Stir gently before serving. It may have separated very slightly, which is nothing to worry about.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 52g)
Calories
275 calories
Total Fat
28 g
Saturated Fat
5 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
22 g
Cholesterol
15 mg
Sodium
500 mg
Total Carbohydrates
5 g
Dietary Fiber
0 g
Sugars
3 g
Protein
1 g
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