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Tartar Sauce

A creamy sauce made with egg yolk, mustard, oil, vinegar, shallots, gherkins, herbs, and cayenne.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Tartar Sauce

Why it works: Chervil and tarragon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 824 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Tartar Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the emulsion

  1. Place the egg yolk in a bowl and beat it for 1-2 minutes with salt, pepper, and dry mustard.

  2. Gradually add the salad oil, first in drops and then in teaspoonfuls, beating well after each addition.

  3. After every six teaspoonfuls of oil, add a teaspoon of vinegar.

Finish and serve

  1. Add the minced shallots, gherkins, chervil, tarragon, and cayenne to the sauce.

  2. Mix thoroughly and serve.

  3. If not used immediately, keep in a cool place.

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. Chervil + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together824 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Shallot + cherviltop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together266 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Shallot + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together602 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  4. Mustard + shallottop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together859 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  5. Mustard + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together901 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolk
Emulsifies the oil and water in the vinegar, giving the sauce its thick, creamy body.
Salad oil
Forms the bulk of the sauce, giving it richness and a smooth texture when emulsified.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the rich oil and balances the flavour.
Shallots
Contribute a mild, sharp onion flavour and aroma throughout the sauce.
Gherkins
Add sourness, crunch and a tangy bite to the sauce.

The step that matters

Adding the oil gradually. Egg yolk can only hold a limited amount of oil before the emulsion breaks. Adding oil in drops at first, and beating well after each addition, lets the lecithin in the yolk coat the droplets so the sauce stays thick and smooth instead of separating.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, pepper, vinegar, shallot, chervil, tarragon):

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Lettucefits about as well
  3. Mustardthe original
  4. Beetrootfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, pepper, vinegar, shallot, chervil, tarragon. 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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