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Bottled Salad Dressing

A vinaigrette made with egg yolks, sugar, mustard, vinegar, butter, and spices, bottled for storage.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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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 ↓

Bottled Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Beat the yolks of the eggs in a bowl.

  2. Add sugar, salt, mustard, black pepper, cayenne, and cream; mix thoroughly.

Make the dressing

  1. In a saucepan, bring vinegar to a boil.

  2. Add butter to the boiling vinegar and let it come to a boil again.

  3. Pour the hot mixture over the egg mixture and stir well.

Cool and bottle

  1. Allow to cool, then pour into bottles and store 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.

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

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

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

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

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

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

  5. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Emulsify and thicken the dressing as they set with the hot liquid.
Butter
Adds richness and body, helping the dressing feel smooth and creamy.
Vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity that defines the dressing's flavour.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar with a touch of sweetness.
Cream
Adds moisture and softness to the texture.

The step that matters

Pouring the hot mixture over the yolks. Egg yolks can scramble if they meet very hot liquid too quickly. Pouring slowly while stirring gently warms the yolks evenly, so the mixture thickens smoothly instead of curdling.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Mustardthe original
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Potatofits about as well

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