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Mayonnaise Dressing

A homemade mayonnaise dressing made with eggs, salt, sugar, mustard, flour, vinegar, cold water, cayenne pepper, and oil.

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 ↓

Mayonnaise Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a bowl, combine the eggs, salt, sugar, mustard, flour, vinegar, and cold water.

  2. Whisk the mixture until smooth.

  3. Slowly add the oil while continuing to whisk until the dressing thickens.

  4. Season with cayenne pepper to taste.

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

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

  3. Mustard + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,066 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  5. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg yolks emulsify the oil into the base, giving the dressing its body and thickness.
Oil
Provides the fat that, dispersed into the base, forms the rich, thick texture.
Mustard
Its natural emulsifiers help hold the oil and water phases together, stabilising the emulsion.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that balances the richness of the oil and sharpens the flavour.
Flour
Helps stabilise the emulsion and adds body so the dressing holds its thickness.

The step that matters

Slowly add the oil while whisking. Oil must be added gradually so it disperses into tiny droplets that the egg and mustard can coat. Adding it too fast overwhelms the emulsifiers, and the mixture can split and fail to thicken.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Mustardthe original
  3. Shallotfits about as well
  4. Cucumberfits about as well

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