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Cabbage Dressing

A vinaigrette-style dressing made with eggs, mustard, flour, butter, vinegar, salt, and pepper, served over hot cabbage.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Cabbage Dressing

Why it works: Mustard and vinegar 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 ↓

Cabbage Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, mix the eggs, mustard, flour, and butter until well combined.

  2. Add vinegar, salt, and pepper to taste.

Serve

  1. Pour the dressing over hot cabbage.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Mustard + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,066 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Eggs
Thicken the dressing as they set gently with heat, giving it body and a creamy texture.
Mustard
Adds sharp, pungent flavour that balances the richness of the eggs and butter.
Flour
Stabilises the dressing so it stays smooth and does not split or separate.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the dressing.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and cuts through its richness.

The step that matters

Pour the dressing over hot cabbage. The dressing is meant to be poured while the cabbage is still hot so it warms and thickens slightly on contact. If the cabbage is cold, the dressing may stay thin and fail to coat well.

Swap the mustard

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

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

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