Sorrel

Oily fish, acid leaf, cream in between. Nothing else needed.

The leaf brings all the acid, so the sauce can be pure fat.

Sourness cuts the yolk the way lemon would, but from inside.

It melts to a puree in butter within seconds. That is the sauce.

Bland starch is the only thing that can absorb this much acid.

River fish, river weed. Same water, same season, same plate.

Pale meat with no acid of its own gets all of it from the leaf.

Sharp green with body, so the sauce does not need cream.

Oxalic sharpness over lactic sharpness. Two acids that taste nothing alike.

Oxalic acid over malic acid. Deliberately punishing, and very good with fish.

Sharpness replaces the shallot vinegar and adds a leaf to chew.

Oxalic sourness on top of tartaric. Two acids that taste nothing alike.

Oxalic sourness with no sugar anywhere; the spirit shows the acid unedited.

Both peak in May. Muscat perfume sweetens the sourness without sugar.