Why it works: Lemon and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,047 recipes. Both carry trans-2-nonenal, which smells cardboard, fatty. The science ↓
Mayonnaise, I
Ingredients
Directions
Make the base
Bring water and lemon juice to a boil.
Rub flour and 2 tablespoons olive oil to a paste.
Stir the paste into the boiling mixture and cook for 5 minutes.
Pour the mixture over beaten egg yolks.
Let cool, but do not let it get cold.
Finish the mayonnaise
Add olive oil gradually, beating with an egg beater.
Add salt and pepper to taste.
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.
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Lemon + peppertop 3% of all pairsSmell alikestrongCooked together27,047 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
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Lemon + olivetop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,922 recipes
Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).
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Olive + peppertop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together30,263 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Lemon + flourtop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together30,404 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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
- Egg yolks
- Emulsifiers that hold the oil and liquid together so the sauce stays smooth and thick.
- Olive oil
- Fat that is whisked in slowly to build the rich body and texture of the sauce.
- Flour
- Thickens the cooked base so it can support the emulsion and stay stable.
- Lemon juice
- Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and balances the richness of the oil.
The step that matters
Add olive oil gradually, beating with an egg beater. Egg yolks can only hold a limited amount of oil in emulsion. Adding oil slowly while beating lets each drop disperse before the next, so the sauce thickens instead of separating into greasy liquid.
“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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