Skip to main content
Dessert

Cooked Salad Dressing

A vinaigrette made by cooking sugar, vinegar, salt, and mustard, then thinning with milk or cream and adding chopped boiled egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

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 ↓

Cooked Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the dressing

  1. In a double boiler, combine sugar, vinegar, salt, and mustard.

  2. Cook while stirring constantly until the mixture thickens.

Finish and serve

  1. Thin the dressing with milk or cream to your desired consistency.

  2. Chop the boiled egg finely and add it before serving.

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. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Sugar + mustardtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,424 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with a touch of sweetness.
Vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity that defines the dressing's flavor.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavor that complements the vinegar and sugar.
Milk or cream
Thins the thickened dressing and adds richness and a smoother mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Cook while stirring constantly until thickened. Heat thickens the mixture, but uneven or intense heat can scorch it or cause lumps. A double boiler supplies gentle, even heat, and constant stirring keeps the mixture moving so it thickens smoothly.

Swap the mustard

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

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

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

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes