How To Fix A Broken Pan Sauce With Just A Splash Of Water

A pan sauce is one of the easiest ways to turn a basic 30-minute meal of meat and vegetables into a decadent dinner that looks like you spent hours on it. Born from the yummy little burned bits left behind in the pan after cooking meat, a pan sauce is, at its core, an emulsion — a carefully balanced suspension of fat in liquid. There are countless variations on the pan sauce theme that you can make by tweaking the fats and liquids you use, but you can make a super simple one with just water and butter.

To make a pan sauce, remove your cooked meat from the pan, add some liquid, and scrape all the browned bits off the bottom of the pan. Bring it to a simmer, then add a few pats of cold butter to finish your pan sauce. Whisk vigorously and simmer to reduce the liquid in the pan, and when the fat-to-water ratio reaches just the right point, the mixture magically comes together into a thick, silky pan sauce. But simmer too long, and your perfect sauce can break into a greasy, bubbly mess. Fortunately, there are lots of ways to fix a broken sauce, but the fix for pan sauces is by far the easiest. All you need is a little bit of water.

The key to a perfect pan sauce is reaching just the right balance between fat and water to achieve emulsion. Too much water and the emulsified sauce separates; too little, and you get a messy pool of fat in the pan. Simmering the sauce to reduce the liquid is how you reach the right balance to form the sauce, but if you simmer off too much liquid, the ratio is off again and your pan sauce will break.

The good news is, all you have to do to fix it is add about ¼ cup of water, then whisk and simmer again. When just enough water evaporates, your sauce will come together again as though nothing ever happened. Better yet, as long as you don't let the pan get so dry that the milk solids in the butter burn, you can fix a broken sauce again and again without any loss in quality. So whether you got caught up prepping a side dish or just distracted scrolling social media, you can save your sauce with just a splash of water.