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Made Mustard

A condiment made by mixing mustard, salt, olive oil, sugar, egg yolk, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Made Mustard

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Pour a little boiling water over the mustard.

  2. Add the salt, then slowly stir in the olive oil.

  3. Mix in the sugar and the beaten egg yolk.

  4. Pour in vinegar to taste.

  5. For best flavor, let it sit overnight.

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 + olivetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,950 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  3. Olive + vinegartop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,297 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  4. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Mustard + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,424 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Mustard
Provides the main pungent flavor and, with the egg yolk, helps emulsify the sauce.
Egg yolk
Acts as an emulsifier, helping the oil and mustard bind into a smooth, thick sauce.
Olive oil
Adds fat and richness, giving the sauce a smooth, creamy body.
Sugar
Balances the sharpness of the mustard and vinegar with mild sweetness.

The step that matters

Adding the olive oil slowly. Oil added too fast can fail to disperse, so the sauce splits instead of thickening. Slow streaming lets the egg yolk and mustard emulsify the oil into fine droplets, producing a smooth, stable sauce.

Swap the mustard

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

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

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