Name: Salad Dressings
Ingredients: ½ cup vinegar; 2 eggs; 3 tablespoons sugar; 2 tablespoons flour; 1 small tablespoon mustard; 1 teaspoon salt; butter (size of an egg); 8 tablespoons cream

Why it works: Vinegar and mustard 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 ↓

Salad Dressings

Ingredients

Directions

Combine the vinegar, eggs, sugar, flour, mustard, salt, and butter in a bowl and mix well.
Chill the mixture, then stir in the cream before serving.

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.

Vinegar + mustardtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together14,067 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together41,516 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together43,450 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).
Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together124,287 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour + mustardtop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,066 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs: Egg proteins thicken the dressing and give it a creamy, rich body.
Flour: Starch thickens the mixture so it clings to leaves instead of running off.
Vinegar: Adds the sharp acidity that balances the sugar and richness.
Sugar: Adds sweetness that softens the sharpness of the vinegar and mustard.
Mustard: Adds sharp, pungent flavour that defines the dressing.
Cream: Adds moisture and richness, lightening the thick base.

Swap the mustard

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

Shallotfits about as well
Chivefits about as well
Mustardthe original
Leekfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against vinegar, egg, sugar, flour, butter, cream. 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.