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Mayonnaise Dressing

A creamy dressing made from egg yolks, mustard, olive oil, tarragon vinegar, lemon juice, salt, and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Mayonnaise Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. In a bowl, beat the egg yolks and add the mustard.

  2. Gradually stir in the olive oil.

  3. Once about half the oil is incorporated, add the tarragon vinegar.

  4. Finally, mix in the lemon juice.

Chill and serve

  1. Refrigerate for 1.5 hours before serving to firm up.

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. Lemon + tarragontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,137 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Pepper + lemontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27,047 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

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

Egg yolks
Emulsify the oil and water into a stable, thick sauce.
Olive oil
Provides the fat that gives the dressing its rich body and texture.
Coleman mustard
Helps stabilise the emulsion and adds sharp flavour.
Tarragon vinegar
Adds acidity and aroma that balance the richness of the oil.
Lemon juice
Adds brightness and acidity that balance the richness of the oil.

The step that matters

Gradually stir in the olive oil. Adding oil too quickly can overwhelm the egg yolks, so the emulsion breaks and the dressing separates instead of thickening. Adding it slowly lets the droplets be coated and dispersed evenly.

Swap the mustard

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, pepper, lemon, olive, tarragon, 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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