Hollandaise sauce

The flat is full of people - some staying, some just stopping by for an hour or so. The weather is autumnally dreadful. The rain and the wind clearly want me to stay indoors. So a real cooking marathon today. We start with eggs Benedict for breakfast, with hollandaise sauce, only the second or third time I've ever attempted it. The results are mixed. I use Delia Smith's recipe for a foaming version of the sauce that will keep in the fridge over night.

2 large eggs, separated
2 teaspoons white wine vinegar
2 teaspoons lemon juice
100g butter
salt and pepper

I put the egg yokes with some salt and pepper in a liquidiser and added the vinegar and lemon juice which I had brought to a boil in my very smallest saucepan (which was still too big). Do this while the liquidiser is running on low - as I discovered, high is not a good idea as the whole thing just splatters.

Then drizzle in the melted butter as slowly as you can with the engine running. When it's ready, put it in a bowl and fold in the egg whites, which should be whipped to the soft-peak stage. I made this last night, and reheated it this morning in the bowl over a saucepan of simmering water. I was not quite careful enough, though, and there were definitely gobbets of scrambled eggs by the time the temperature was hot enough. The taste was okay, but not really luxurious enough - the egg whites make the whole thing pallid and more diluted. And the lemon and vinegar was a bit much, making the sauce a little bit too sharp.

In future, I shall make this sauce just as it's needed, rather than the night before, and add maybe just the tiniest squeeze of lemon juice and leave out the vinegar. And I need to be a bit more generous with the pepper. Of course, the chance of me going to all this bother more than once or twice a year are slim.