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Sauce

Mustard Sauce

A thickened sauce made from egg yolks, mustard, sugar, allspice, cayenne pepper, currant jelly, vinegar, and optional butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and allspice match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,928 recipes. Both carry methyleugenol, which smells clove, spice. The science ↓

Mustard Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. In a saucepan, combine the egg yolks, mustard, sugar, allspice, and cayenne pepper.

  2. Add the currant jelly and vinegar, and mix well.

  3. Place the saucepan over low heat and stir constantly for 1-2 minutes until slightly thickened.

Store

  1. Remove from heat and pour into a jar.

  2. Let it cool, then store in a cool place or cellar.

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 + allspicetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,928 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  2. Allspice + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,395 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  5. Allspice + curranttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,359 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl benzoate (fruity, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Thicken the sauce as they gently set over low heat, giving it body.
Mustard
Adds the sharp, pungent flavour that defines the sauce.
Currant jelly
Provides sweetness and fruity body that balances the vinegar.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that sharpens the flavour and keeps the sauce tangy.
Sugar
Sweetens the sauce and balances the acidity and heat.

The step that matters

Stirring over low heat. Egg yolks thicken when gently heated but can scramble if the heat is too high or they are left unstirred. Constant stirring over low heat keeps the sauce smooth while it thickens.

Swap the currant

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

  1. Lemonfits better
  2. Limefits better
  3. Cherryfits better
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, mustard, sugar, allspice, pepper, 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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