What better on a dark winter’s morning than a lie in before a long, relaxed brunch? Alan Jones of Almeida restaurant and Helena Puolakka of Skylon here share a couple of recipes: one, the classic hollandaise sauce and the other a Finnish rice porridge with dried-fruit soup…

First up is hollandaise à la head chef Alan Jones, who whips it up every weekend as part of his relaxed Sunday menu at the Almeida restaurant. This is a sauce that can scare with its temperamental nature but, once mastered, is the key to delicious eggs Benedict, Royale or Florentine. Don’t be frightened, but bear in mind there are a few rules – chief among them is that hollandaise must be eaten fresh, as it doesn’t keep.

Hollandaise may be made with and served alongside egg, but it shouldn’t taste eggy. “The first flavour you taste should be butter, not egg,” says Alan. “If you taste egg then add more clarified butter. If the sauce is too thick to add more butter then mix in a tablespoon of water first. Next, you should taste an acidic kick, which can be adjusted to your taste with lemon juice. Finally, the sauce should be perfectly seasoned with a warm note from the cayenne pepper.”

Sauce hollandaise (serves 6)

Ingredients for the reduction

250ml white wine vinegar
1 shallot, chopped very fine
5 black peppercorns
1 bay leaf
50ml water
50ml white wine

Remaining ingredients for the hollandaise

4 egg yolks
400ml warm clarified butter, plus a little extra for adjustment (melted butter with buttermilk removed)

Method:

Place the vinegar, chopped shallot, peppercorns and bay leaf in a pan. Bring to the boil and reduce by half. Then, add the water and the wine, bring back to the boil, remove from heat and allow to cool. This will store for a month in the fridge.

To make hollandaise you use just over one tablespoon of reduction to every egg. Put five tablespoons of the reduction, the egg yolks and a dash of water in a large heatproof bowl then place over a bain marie. Now, using a balloon whisk, whisk until the mixture becomes light, fluffy and thick (this is a sabayon), but not lumpy or scrambled.

Remove from the heat. Now take your clarified butter, which must be warm. If too cold it will set your sauce hard and if too hot it will split the sauce. Start adding it to your sabayon slowly; making sure each spoonful of butter is completely incorporated before adding more.

Once the butter is all added, season the sauce with salt and a generous pinch of cayenne pepper and taste. Adjust the seasoning following the guide above. Store in a warm place until needed, but eat as soon as possible.

Finnish rice pudding and dried-fruit soup (serves 4-6)

This could be served as an alternative to porridge, and would be perfect for a lazy weekend morning when you have enough time to potter around the kitchen. The contrast between piping hot rice pudding and cool dried-fruit soup is delicious.

Ingredients for the dried-fruit soup

500ml water
500ml apple juice
500g mix dried fruit (sultanas, figs, plums, apricots, apples)
150g sugar
2 cinnamon sticks
1 vanilla pod
3 tbsp potato flour
juice of ½ a lemon

Ingredients for the rice pudding

200ml water
200ml round pudding rice
1l milk
½ tsp salt

Method:

First make the dried-fruit soup by gently heating the water, apple juice, fruit, sugar, cinnamon and vanilla for 20 minutes. Mix the potato flour into 50ml of cold water and add to the soup mix, slowly pouring and mixing all the time. When the soup comes to the boil, take it off the heat, add the lemon juice and allow it to cool down.

Next, make the rice pudding by measuring the water and rice into a pan. Cook until the rice has absorbed all the liquid. Now add the milk and cook gently, mixing regularly. Simmer for 40 minutes before adding the salt.

Serve by pouring the cooled soup over the hot rice pudding.