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Salad

Cream Salad Dressing

A vinaigrette-style dressing made with vinegar, water, butter, egg yolks, mustard, corn starch, sugar, salt, and cayenne pepper.

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 saucepan, combine the vinegar and water and bring to a boil.

  2. Add the butter to the boiling mixture.

  3. In a separate bowl, beat the egg yolks with the mustard, salt, corn starch, sugar, and cayenne pepper until foamy.

  4. Pour the boiling vinegar and water mixture into the egg yolk mixture, stirring continuously.

  5. Place the bowl in a pan of hot water on the stove, beating constantly until it thickens but does not boil.

  6. Remove from heat just before boiling and transfer to a cold bowl, beating hard for a few minutes.

Cool and store

  1. Once completely cool, pour into a glass jar, seal, and refrigerate.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 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. Corn + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,324 recipes

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

  5. Mustard + corntop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together463 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Thicken and emulsify the dressing as they set with gentle heat.
Corn starch
Thickens the dressing so it holds a creamy body without boiling.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, creamy mouthfeel to the dressing.
Strong cider vinegar
Provides the acidity that gives the dressing its sharp, tangy flavor.

The step that matters

Thickening the egg yolk mixture over hot water. Egg yolks set between about 140 and 160°F and can scramble if overheated. Keeping the bowl over hot water, not direct heat, and beating constantly yields a smooth, thick dressing.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardthe original
  3. Cucumberfits less well
  4. Potatofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against cider, vinegar, butter, corn, sugar, pepper, egg. 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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