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Salad

Salad Dressing

A simple salad dressing made with eggs, butter, mustard, vinegar, cream or milk, seasoned with pepper and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Salad Dressing

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 ↓

Salad Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Make the dressing

  1. In a saucepan, combine the beaten eggs, butter, mustard, and vinegar.

  2. Heat over low flame, stirring constantly until thickened.

  3. Remove from heat and let cool.

Season

  1. Once cool, add pepper and salt to taste.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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

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

  3. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  4. Vinegar + peppertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,814 recipes

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

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Egg proteins set when heated, thickening the dressing into a smooth, creamy texture.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a silky mouthfeel in the cooked dressing.
Vinegar
Provides acidity that sharpens the flavour and balances the richness of the eggs and butter.
Mustard
Adds sharp, savoury flavour and helps keep the emulsified dressing stable.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture and softens the dressing, making it lighter and creamier.

The step that matters

Heat over low flame and stir constantly. Egg proteins begin to set as they warm, and if the heat is too high or stirring stops, they can scramble and curdle. Gentle, constant heat and stirring thicken the mixture evenly into a smooth dressing.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Potatofits about as well
  3. Mustardthe original
  4. Spinachfits about as well

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