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Salad

Cream Salad Dressing

A thick dressing made from sour or sweet cream, egg yolks, sugar, butter, spices, and cider vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cider and vinegar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,431 recipes. Both carry 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol, which smells smoky, clove. The science ↓

Cream Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, combine the cream, beaten egg yolks, and sugar.

  2. Add melted butter, pepper, cayenne, mustard, and salt; mix well.

  3. Slowly stir in the hot cider vinegar.

Cook and serve

  1. Transfer the mixture to a double boiler and cook until thick, being careful not to curdle.

  2. Let it cool before using on raw cabbage, lettuce, tomatoes, or cooked cauliflower, beans, and potatoes.

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. Cider + vinegartop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,431 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-ethyl-2-methoxyphenol (smoky, clove).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  5. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Thicken the dressing and add richness as they set during gentle cooking.
Cream
Adds body and a smooth, rich texture to the dressing.
Melted butter
Adds fat for a smooth mouthfeel and rich flavour.
Cider vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that balances the richness of the cream and yolks.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that softens the sharpness of the vinegar.

The step that matters

Cooking in the double boiler. Egg yolks thicken as their proteins set with gentle heat, but too much heat makes them curdle and turn grainy. Cooking slowly over simmering water and stirring keeps the dressing smooth.

Swap the mustard

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, egg, sugar, butter, pepper, cider, 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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