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Cream Dressing

A thickened dressing made with eggs, butter, sugar, vinegar, salt, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cream Dressing

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. Beat the eggs in a bowl.

  2. Add sugar, salt, vinegar, and butter to the eggs.

  3. Cook the mixture in a double boiler until it thickens.

Finish

  1. Remove from heat and fold 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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  3. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Thicken as they cook gently, giving the dressing its body and structure.
Sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the sharpness of the vinegar.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the dressing a tangy flavour.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother mouthfeel.
Cream
Folded in whipped, it lightens the dressing and adds richness.

The step that matters

Cook the mixture in a double boiler until it thickens. Eggs thicken through gentle heat, but too much heat can scramble them into lumps. A double boiler keeps the temperature steady and moderate, so the mixture thickens smoothly.

“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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