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Boiled Salad Dressing

A thickened dressing made from vinegar, egg yolks, butter, flour, cornstarch, mustard, sugar, and spices.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Boiled Salad Dressing

Why it works: Vinegar and mustard 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 ↓

Boiled Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Thicken the vinegar

  1. Heat the vinegar with salt and pepper in a double boiler.

  2. Blend flour and cornstarch smoothly with 2 tablespoons of water.

  3. Slowly pour the boiling vinegar over the mixture.

  4. Return the mixture to the boiler.

  5. Cook while stirring until it thickens.

Add the eggs

  1. Blend mustard and sugar, then add to slightly beaten egg yolks.

  2. Place the boiler over hot water in the lower boiler, then remove from heat.

  3. Add the egg mixture and butter, beating carefully until smooth.

Store and serve

  1. Cool and store in covered jars.

  2. When ready to use, mix in plain or whipped cream in a ratio of 1 part cream to 3 parts dressing or equal parts.

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. Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together14,067 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,066 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Vinegar + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Egg yolks
Thicken the dressing and give it a rich, smooth body as they set gently with heat.
Butter
Adds richness and a smooth, velvety mouthfeel to the finished dressing.
Cornstarch
Thickens the vinegar base so the dressing holds its body when cooled.
Flour
Adds further thickening to the vinegar base alongside the cornstarch.
Vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity that gives the dressing its tang.
Mustard
Adds sharp flavour and helps stabilise the emulsion of egg and butter.

The step that matters

Adding the egg mixture and butter. Egg yolks begin to scramble when they get too hot, so the mixture must be kept over gentle hot water and beaten constantly. Gentle heat and steady stirring let the yolks thicken smoothly instead of curdling.

Swap the white pepper

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Cinnamonfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, vinegar, flour, sugar, mustard, 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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