July 19, 2026
I’ve never understood why we insist on drowning seafood in cocktail sauce.
Take a beautifully cooked shrimp. Or a tender piece of crab. Or, my personal favorite, a chilled langostino tail. These are delicate ingredients with subtle flavors that took nature considerable effort to perfect.
Then along comes cocktail sauce. One enthusiastic dunk later, all you can taste is ketchup and horseradish.
I have nothing against cocktail sauce. Used sparingly, a little tangy sharpness can be wonderful with shellfish. The problem is, instead of supporting the seafood, it insists on being the star of the show. I prefer a sauce that understands its role.
The British have one.
I first encountered Marie Rose sauce in England in 1978. It was dressing a prawn cocktail served at the Prince Regent, an atmospheric old place in Chertsey that had begun life as a seventeenth-century coaching inn. Prawn cocktail was a dish enjoying enormous popularity throughout Britain at that time, and one bite told me exactly why: Marie Rose sauce. Like cocktail sauce, it contains tomato, citrus and a touch of horseradish. Unlike cocktail sauce, it doesn’t arrive shouting.
The foundation is mayonnaise enriched with a little cream. Lemon provides brightness, Worcestershire sauce contributes umami, and horseradish stays in the background instead of dominating the other flavors.
In other words, Marie Rose sauce is a good supporting actor. Its job is to make the seafood taste irresistible.
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