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Dessert

Mayonnaise Dressing. No. 1

A creamy dressing made with mustard, sugar, cayenne pepper, salt, egg yolks, lemon juice, vinegar, oil, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 Dressing. No. 1

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a bowl set in a pan of ice water, beat the egg yolks and dry ingredients until very light and thick using a silver or wooden spoon.

  2. Gradually add the mustard, sugar, cayenne, salt, lemon juice, and vinegar, mixing well.

  3. Slowly incorporate the oil while continuing to beat until the mixture is smooth and creamy.

  4. Fold in the whipped cream gently until combined.

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

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

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Mustard + lemontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,816 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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 into the mixture and thicken it into a smooth, creamy dressing.
Oil
Forms the bulk of the emulsion, giving the dressing its rich, creamy body.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that balances the richness of the oil and yolks.
Whipped cream
Adds lightness and softness to the finished dressing when folded in.

The step that matters

Slowly incorporate the oil while beating. Adding oil too fast can overwhelm the egg yolks, so the emulsion breaks and the dressing turns oily and separated. Keeping the bowl cool and adding oil slowly lets the yolk lecithin surround the droplets and hold the emulsion together.

“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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