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Mayonaise Salad Dressing

A homemade mayonnaise dressing made with egg yolks, olive oil, vinegar or lemon juice, mustard, salt, and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Vinegar and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,067 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Mayonaise Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Make the emulsion

  1. Place the two raw yolks in a pint bowl and add 2 tablespoons of olive oil.

  2. Set the bowl in ice water to chill and beat with an egg beater for about 30 seconds.

  3. Gradually add more olive oil while whipping until the mixture thickens like softened butter.

Finish the dressing

  1. Alternately add vinegar and olive oil until all is incorporated.

  2. Stir in the mustard and cayenne for seasoning.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Olive + vinegartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,297 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  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 yolks
Emulsify the oil and water-based vinegar, giving the dressing its thick, creamy body.
Olive oil
Forms the fat phase that, dispersed in droplets, thickens the dressing into a rich texture.
Vinegar or lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and helps keep the dressing tangy.
Made mustard
Acts as an extra emulsifier that helps stabilise the dressing and adds sharpness.

The step that matters

Adding the oil gradually while whipping. Oil must be added slowly so the droplets are fully absorbed by the egg yolk. Adding it too fast can break the emulsion, leaving the dressing thin and separated.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Cucumberfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Mustardthe original
  4. Tomatofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, olive, vinegar. 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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