A coulis (/kuːˈliː/ koo-LEE) is a form of thin sauce made from puréed and strained vegetables or fruits.^[1] A vegetable coulis is commonly used on meat and vegetable dishes, and it can also be used as a base for soups or other sauces. Fruit coulis are most often used on desserts. Raspberry coulis, for example, is especially popular with poached apples or Key lime pie. Tomato coulis may be add flavor to other sauces, or on its own (either cold or hot).^[2]

The term comes from Old French coleïs, meaning flowing^[3] or running.

The way of making coulis varies with the type of fruit or vegetable used: it is possible to simply mash raspberries and strawberries through a strainer with a spoon, while ripe pears and melons are usually pureed in a blender prior to straining, apples have to be cooked first. Depending on the consistency of the puree, either a chinois (for the softest purees), food mill, or drum sieve (for the hardest ones) can be used for straining. Reduction of coulis (to strengthen its sweetness and flavor) can be difficult as the sauce may acquire a jam-like taste when heated, so sometimes the vacuum evaporation is used to boil the mixture at a lower temperature.^[4]

Additives

While fruit coulis can be used with its natural flavor, a small amount of fruit brandy (Kirsch, framboise, mirabelle [fr]) is occasionally added when the underripe fruits are used. Desserts that are not very sweet, like the brioche, might benefit from coulis with added sugar, while the taste of the ice cream, on the other hand, improves with a contrasting unsweetened sauce.^[4]

Older uses

In its current meaning, the term is fairly new in English language, with widespread use, alongside Nouvelle cuisine, since the 1980s (Merriam-Webster Dictionary provides 1952 as the first recoded use in the modern sense^[3]). However, originally with a spelling cullis, the word has six hundreds years of history in the English language. The cullis was derived from an Old French coleis (originally from Latin: cōlāre, "to strain"), the French word defining straining, pouring, flowing, or sliding (the latter meaning is still preserved in English "porticullis"). The term was used to denote strained broth, originally likely made from chicken, later also from meat and fish. The cullis was used as a sauce or as a base for other sauces.^[5]