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Potato Mayonnaise

A creamy spread made from mashed baked potato mixed with mustard, vinegar, salt, optional powdered sugar, cayenne pepper, and oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and mustard are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,340 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Potato Mayonnaise

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the base

  1. Remove and mash the inside of the baked potato.

  2. Add mustard, vinegar, salt, powdered sugar (if desired), and cayenne pepper.

  3. Force the mixture through a fine sieve.

Emulsify the oil

  1. Gradually add 1 tablespoon of vinegar.

  2. Then add the oil, one tablespoon at a time, mixing as you go.

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. Potato + mustardtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,340 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  4. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Baked potato
Its mashed starch forms the thick body of the sauce, replacing some of the egg-based structure.
Oil
Supplies the fat that, when dispersed slowly, gives the sauce its creamy richness.
Mustard
Its natural emulsifiers help hold the oil and vinegar together so the sauce does not separate.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and balances the richness of the oil.

The step that matters

Adding the oil. Oil must go in slowly, a tablespoon at a time, while mixing. Adding it too fast overwhelms the emulsion, so the oil separates and the sauce breaks instead of turning thick and creamy.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Horseradishfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Radishfits better
  4. Potatothe original

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