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Salad

Cold Sauces and Salads

A vinaigrette made with chili vinegar, French vinegar, and olive oil, optionally flavored with eschalot vinegar, anchovy essence, mustard, tarragon vinegar, or garlic.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Mustard and tarragon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 901 recipes. Both carry methyleugenol, which smells clove, spice. The science ↓

Cold Sauces and Salads

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Stir together the chili vinegar and French vinegar in a bowl to taste.

  2. Gradually add olive oil in small portions while stirring briskly until the mixture resembles custard.

  3. Mix in any optional ingredients as desired. If using garlic, ensure it is a very small piece to avoid overpowering the sauce.

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 + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together901 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  2. Olive + garlictop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,665 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  3. Mustard + garlictop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  4. Vinegar + tarragontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,547 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Olive oil
Forms the body of the dressing and carries its richness and mouthfeel.
Strong chili vinegar
Provides the sharp acidity and heat that defines the dressing.
French vinegar
Adds acidity that balances the oil and rounds out the sharpness of the chili vinegar.

The step that matters

Adding the olive oil. Oil must be added slowly in small portions while stirring briskly so it emulsifies into the vinegar. Adding it too fast makes the mixture separate instead of thickening into a smooth, custard-like texture.

Swap the mustard

The recipe marks mustard as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (vinegar, olive, sauce, tarragon, garlic):

  1. Mustardthe original
  2. Shallotfits about as well
  3. Tomatofits about as well
  4. Chivefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, olive, sauce, tarragon, garlic. 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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