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Salad

Mayonnaise Salad Dressing

A creamy dressing made with raw egg yolk, olive oil, mustard, salt, and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Olive and mustard match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,950 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Mayonnaise Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine the yolk of one raw egg in a bowl.

  2. Slowly stir in the olive oil until fully incorporated, using up to ½ cup.

  3. Season with cayenne pepper, salt, and mustard to taste.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Olive + mustardtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Olive + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,263 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Egg + mustardtop 28% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,210 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  5. Egg + olivetop 31% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,340 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Egg yolk
Emulsifies the oil and water, letting the oil spread into tiny droplets for a thick, creamy texture.
Olive oil
Provides the fat that gives the dressing its richness and body as it emulsifies with the yolk.
Mustard
Helps stabilise the emulsion and adds sharpness that balances the richness of the oil.

The step that matters

Slowly stir in the olive oil. Adding oil too fast overwhelms the yolk, so it cannot break the oil into fine droplets and the mayonnaise may split into a greasy, separated liquid. Adding it slowly lets the emulsion form and thicken.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, olive, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Tomatofits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, olive, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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