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Mayonnaise Dressing for Salads, Meats, Etc

A creamy dressing made with eggs, butter, sour cream, vinegar, and whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and clove match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,451 recipes. Both carry ethyl octanoate, which smells fruity, wine. The science ↓

Mayonnaise Dressing for Salads, Meats, Etc

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing base

  1. Beat the eggs well in a bowl.

  2. Gradually pour in the hot melted butter while continuing to beat the eggs.

  3. Stir in the sour cream, sugar, red pepper, mustard, and cornstarch until well blended.

Cook and finish

  1. Boil the garlic clove in the vinegar and water for five minutes, then remove the garlic.

  2. Add the vinegar mixture to the egg mixture, stirring briskly over low heat until it thickens.

  3. Season with salt to taste and bottle the dressing.

  4. Just before serving, beat in the whipped cream.

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. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  2. Mustard + garlictop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,053 recipes

    Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).

  3. Pepper + garlictop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,090 recipes

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

  4. Mustard + clovetop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,829 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Thicken and emulsify the dressing as they set over gentle heat.
Butter
Adds richness and body, emulsified into the beaten eggs.
Sour cream
Adds tang and creaminess to the dressing.
Cornstarch
Thickens the dressing and helps keep it stable.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the dressing its sharp flavor.
Whipped cream
Lightens the texture and adds a smooth, airy finish.

The step that matters

Adding the hot melted butter. Pour the butter gradually while beating the eggs constantly. Adding it too fast can prevent the fat from emulsifying, and the eggs may scramble or the sauce may separate.

Swap the clove

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Tarragonfits better
  3. Nutmegfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, butter, cream, sugar, pepper, mustard, garlic. 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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