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Boiled Salad Dressing

A vinaigrette thickened with cornstarch and egg yolks, boiled and finished with egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Boiled Salad Dressing

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 ↓

Boiled Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Mix cornstarch, salt, red pepper, mustard, and sugar with water.

  2. Add this mixture to the egg yolks.

  3. Heat vinegar in a double boiler and add the egg mixture.

Cook and finish

  1. Cook for 10 minutes, stirring constantly.

  2. Remove from heat and fold in stiffly beaten egg whites.

  3. If dressing thickens too much, thin it with sour 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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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

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

  3. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  4. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity that gives the dressing its tang.
Cornstarch
Thickens the dressing as its starch swells in the heated liquid.
Egg yolks
Thicken the dressing as they cook and add richness.
Egg whites
Folded in at the end to lighten the texture of the dressing.
Sugar
Adds sweetness to balance the vinegar's acidity.

The step that matters

Cooking the egg mixture. Egg yolks can scramble if they overheat or are left unstirred. Constant stirring over gentle heat keeps the yolks smooth while the starch thickens the dressing evenly.

Swap the mustard

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, pepper, sugar, egg, butter. 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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