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Salad

Good Boiled Salad Dressing

A boiled salad dressing made with egg yolks, mustard, sugar, salt, pepper, cayenne, cream, vinegar, and butter.

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 ↓

Good Boiled Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Beat the egg yolks in a bowl.

  2. Add sugar, mustard, salt, pepper, and cayenne, and mix until smooth.

  3. Stir in the cream.

  4. In a saucepan, bring vinegar and butter to a boil.

  5. Pour the hot vinegar mixture over the egg mixture and stir well.

  6. Return to the stove and boil until thickened to a cream-like consistency.

  7. Let cool.

  8. Store in a glass jar for later use.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Pepper + vinegartop 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the dressing and emulsify it into a creamy texture when heated.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the dressing a smooth, mellow body.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that sharpens flavor and helps the eggs set as the dressing cooks.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the vinegar and mustard with sweetness.

The step that matters

Boil until thickened. Egg yolks thicken as their proteins set with heat, but overheating can curdle them into lumps. Cook gently and stir while the dressing thickens.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Mustardthe original
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Potatofits about as well

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