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Mayonnaise Sauce for Fish

A creamy mayonnaise-based sauce for fish made with egg yolks, olive oil, mustard, vinegar, lemon juice, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and lemon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓

Mayonnaise Sauce for Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mayonnaise base

  1. In a bowl, beat the egg yolks and slowly add the olive oil until the mixture resembles butter.

  2. Stir in the salt, then gradually add more olive oil.

  3. Mix in the dry mustard and cayenne pepper.

Finish the sauce

  1. Alternately add the vinegar and lemon juice until the sauce thickens enough to spread.

  2. Before serving, fold in the whipped cream.

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. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  2. Mustard + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Olive + lemontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,922 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 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

Egg yolks
Emulsify the oil and water-based acids into a stable, thick sauce.
Olive oil
Provides the fat that gives the sauce its rich body and smooth texture.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens flavor and helps thicken the emulsion.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and bright flavor that balances the richness of the oil.
Whipped cream
Lightens the texture and adds softness when folded in at the end.

The step that matters

Adding the oil slowly to the yolks. Oil must be added in a thin, gradual stream so the yolk lecithin can surround the droplets. Adding it too fast breaks the emulsion, leaving a greasy, runny sauce that will not thicken.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Avocadofits about as well
  2. Lemonthe original
  3. Limefits about as well
  4. Cherryfits about as well

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