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 ↓
Mayonnaise Sauce
Ingredients
Directions
In a round-bottomed basin, mix Velouté or Blanquette sauce with melted white jelly, salt, pepper, and nutmeg.
Set the basin in a bucket or saucepan with broken ice.
Using a wooden spoon, slowly pour in olive oil while stirring continuously.
Once the sauce is thickened, add lemon juice and chopped chervil and tarragon.
Stir well and serve.
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.
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Chervil + tarragontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together824 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
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Lemon + tarragontop 1% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together1,137 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
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Lemon + cherviltop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together358 recipes
Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).
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Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together27,047 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Nutmeg + tarragontop 4% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together213 recipes
Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Olive oil
- Forms the fat base that gives the sauce its rich body as it emulsifies.
- Velouté or blanquette sauce
- Provides the body and base that the oil is whisked into.
- White jelly
- Adds body and helps hold the sauce together as it thickens.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the flavour and balances the richness of the oil.
The step that matters
Slowly pour in the olive oil while stirring continuously. Adding oil too fast before the base has absorbed it can break the emulsion, so the sauce separates instead of thickening smoothly. Keeping the mixture cold over ice helps it stay stable while the oil is incorporated.
Swap the nutmeg
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sauce, pepper, olive, lemon, chervil, tarragon):
- Capersfits better
- Parsleyfits better
- Thymefits better
- Nutmegthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against sauce, pepper, olive, lemon, 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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