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Salad

Sour Cream Salad Dressing

A creamy dressing made with eggs, sour cream, salt, pepper, and tarragon vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and tarragon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,399 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Sour Cream Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Beat the yolks of the eggs until light.

  2. Gradually stir in the sour cream.

  3. Add the salt, pepper, and tarragon vinegar.

  4. Fold in the well-beaten egg whites.

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. Pepper + tarragontop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,399 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Tarragon + vinegartop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,547 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  4. Cream + tarragontop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together574 recipes

    Shared aroma: octanal (fat, soap).

  5. Egg + tarragontop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,789 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-methylbutyraldehyde (malty, chocolate).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Yolks add richness and body, while beaten whites add lightness and airy texture.
Sour cream
Provides thickness, creamy body, and a mild tangy flavor to the dressing.
Tarragon vinegar
Adds acidity and a sharp herbal aroma that balances the rich cream.

The step that matters

Fold in the well-beaten egg whites. Folding gently keeps the air beaten into the whites, which gives the dressing its light texture. Stirring vigorously deflates the foam and makes the dressing denser.

“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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