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Boiled Dressing

A thickened dressing made by cooking flour, salt, cayenne, mustard, egg yolk, butter, water, and vinegar over boiling water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Boiled Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a bowl, mix the flour, salt, cayenne, and mustard.

  2. Add the slightly beaten egg yolk, butter, water, and vinegar slowly.

  3. Cook the mixture over boiling water until it thickens.

  4. Strain the dressing and let it cool.

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. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Mustard + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,066 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + vinegartop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

Butter and flour 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

Egg yolk
Thickens the dressing as it cooks and adds richness.
Flour
Helps thicken the dressing and gives it body.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth, rich mouthfeel.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the dressing its tang.
Sugar
Balances the acidity with a touch of sweetness.

The step that matters

Cook over boiling water until it thickens. Egg yolk thickens as its proteins gently set with heat. Too little heat leaves the dressing thin, while overheating can scramble the yolk into lumps, so stir constantly and watch closely.

Swap the mustard

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, egg, sugar, butter, flour, 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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