Sauces · Czech cuisine
Horseradish sauce
Czech křenová omáčka: a warm sauce of grated horseradish – with butter and stock, or with cream and almonds.
At a glance
- Origin
- Czech and Central European cooking, documented in 19th- and 20th-century cookbooks.
- Production
- Roux with cream or stock, grated horseradish stirred in after boiling.
- Ratio
- Janků-Sandtnerová for 5: 30 g butter, 30 g flour and 20 g horseradish.
- Pairs with
- Boiled beef.
- Use
- According to Rettigová, cold horseradish with vinegar goes with cold roast and blue-cooked fish.
Horseradish sauce (křenová omáčka) is a warm Czech sauce with grated horseradish, traditionally served with boiled beef. Old cookbooks know two main forms: a butter sauce made with beef stock and a sweeter cream version with almonds.
In the 1849 German edition Rettigová gives “Schmettenkren”: sweet cream is simmered with sugar and peeled almonds, bound with butter and flour, and grated horseradish is stirred in last; she advises adding it only after boiling, because boiling robs it of its bite. She also has “sauerer Kren”, a cold horseradish with bread roll and vinegar. In 1947 Janků-Sandtnerová describes a butter horseradish sauce of butter, flour and beef stock seasoned with mace, plus a cream-and-almond variant.
Techniques and tips
Related entries
Sources
- Magdalena Dobromila Rettig: Die Haus-Köchin (1849), Schmettenkren, Suppenkren, Sauerer Kren
- Marie Janků-Sandtnerová: Kniha rozpočtů a kuchařských předpisů (1947), Máslová křenová omáčka a Smetanová mandlová křenová omáčka
- Seznam Zprávy: Nejoblíbenější česká omáčka. Co všechno víme a nevíme o svíčkové? (2023)