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Green Sauce is the name of several rather different sauces containing mainly herbs, namely the Italian salsa verde, the French sauce verte, and the German grüne Soße or Frankfurter Grie Soß (Frankfurt dialect).

Contents 1 History 2 Italian salsa verde 3 French sauce verte 4 German Grüne Soße 5 Green Sauce in Tex Mex cuisine

The basic recipe is probably from the Near East and, as such, is probably at least 2,000 years old. Roman legionaries brought it to Italy, from where it was exported to France and Germany. Evidence suggests that it was introduced in Frankfurt am Main by the Italian trading families Bolongaro and Crevenna around 1700. The German variant uses a different mix of herbs, since Mediterranean herbs were not available in Germany at the time.

The Italian salsa verde is a bread sauce, and includes parsley, vinegar, capers, garlic, anchovies, and possibly mustard. The bread is soaked in vinegar and blended with the other ingredients, which creates an emulsion somewhat similar to vinaigrette.

The French sauce verte au pain was already known in the Renaissance, and was originally a bread sauce very similar to the Italian. Today, however, the term frequently refers to a kind of mayonnaise flavoured with tarragon, and sometimes parsley and sage. Lemon juice is often used instead of vinegar.

There are two traditional types of Hessian green sauce which are popular in the Frankfurt am Main and Kassel area. The Frankfurt-style is made from hard-boiled eggs, oil (but not olive oil), vinegar, salt, and generous amount of seven fresh herbs, namely borage, sorrel, cress, chervil, chives, parsley, and burnet. Variants include dill, lovage, lemon balm and even spinach. In more frugal times, daisy leaves, broad plantain leaves, and dandelion leaves were also used. Since the sauce is mainly an emulsion of fat and egg yolk, it may be classified as a kind of mayonnaise (although common mayonnaise uses raw yolks). Today, buttermilk, sour cream ("schmand"), quark, or yogurt is often added in order to reduce the oil content of the sauce.

The green sauce typical of the city of Kassel is made with a sour cream base, and is nearly white.

The sauce is served with potatoes boiled in the skin, accompanying either hard-boiled eggs or roasted ox brisket. Hard apple Cider is a good drink to go with it. This was supposedly Goethe's favourite meal; however the legend that his mother invented it is certainly untrue.

Green sauce (also known as salsa verde) is served with red sauce as an appetizer in Tex Mex restaurants in Texas and neighboring states. It is generally made with jalepenos or other green chiles and tomatillos. It has a spicy and creamy flavor. The tomatillos give it a green color. It is served with tortilla chips for dipping, or with other recipes.