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Sidney Smith's Recipe for Salad Dressing

A creamy potato-based dressing with mustard, olive oil, vinegar, eggs, onion, and optional anchovy sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Anchovy and sauce are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,057 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Sidney Smith's Recipe for Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. Strain the boiled potatoes through a kitchen sieve until smooth.

  2. Add the mustard, olive oil, vinegar, and mashed eggs to the potatoes. Mix well and season with salt.

  3. Fold in the chopped onion and anchovy sauce if using.

Serve

  1. Serve over your salad.

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. Anchovy + saucetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  3. Mustard + oniontop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,259 recipes

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

  4. Potato + olivetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,458 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Potato + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,340 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Boiled potatoes
Strained to a smooth base that gives the dressing body and creaminess.
Olive oil
Adds fat that emulsifies with the vinegar and mustard for a smooth, rich texture.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that brightens the dressing and balances the richness of the oil.
Mustard
Helps emulsify the oil and vinegar and adds a sharp flavour.
Boiled eggs
Mashed eggs add body and richness to the dressing.

The step that matters

Add the oil and vinegar gradually. Mustard and the starch and protein from the potatoes and eggs help hold oil and vinegar together as an emulsion. Adding the oil too quickly, or without thorough mixing, can cause it to separate and leave the dressing greasy and thin.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mustard, olive, vinegar, egg, onion, anchovy, sauce):

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mustard, olive, vinegar, egg, onion, anchovy, sauce. 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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