Henry Bain’s Sauce was the creation of Louisville, Kentucky’s Pendennis Club’s legendary Maître d’, Henry Bain (1863-1928), who was one of the Pendennis Club’s first employees dating back to 1881. He perfected this sauce to complement steak, pork and local game brought in by club members.
For over a century, the Pendennis Club Original Henry Bain’s Famous Sauce was only available to members and guests of the world-renowned club. However, over time, the sauce has become famous for its sweet and spicy flair, rendering itself a Southern staple.
At one time, Henry Bain’s sauce was the most requested recipe from Louisville, Kentucky’s local media outlets – although, the recipe has many published variations. When Bourbon Barrel Foods teamed up with Pendennis Club, it was our goal to create the most authentic version you could find on the market. Founder and owner Matt Jamie’s first order of business was to preserve the recipe to the best of his ability. “We removed any unnatural ingredients and depleted the North American market of picked walnuts when we launched, the essential ingredient, in my mind,” Matt says.
Not much information survives Henry Bain. However, Pendennis Club confirms that he officially became the Club’s Matri d’ and held this position at the Club before his retirement, and members and the community well respected him. Matt says, “Kentucky’s culinary history drives my decision to launch a new product. I wanted to learn everything I could to embrace the tradition. I hired an Archivist to research Henry Bain. During the process, we retrieved his birth and death certificate and found out he was buried in New Albany, Indiana. We found his headstone and visited it. We even brought him a bottle of our Henry Bain’s sauce.”
