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Salad

Salad Mayonnaise

A simple mayonnaise dressing for salads.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Salad Mayonnaise

Ingredients

Directions

Make the emulsion

  1. Rub the mustard with the oil in a bowl.

  2. Add black pepper, salt, and sugar; mix well.

  3. Gradually stir in the vinegar.

  4. Beat in the egg until well combined.

Serve

  1. Serve with any salad such as lettuce, cabbage, or potato.

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

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Mustard + sugartop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,424 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

Egg
Its yolk lecithin holds the oil and vinegar together as a stable emulsion.
Mustard
Its natural compounds help stabilise the emulsion so it does not separate.
Oil
Supplies the fat that gives the sauce its thick, rich body.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that gives the sauce its sharp, tangy flavour.

The step that matters

Gradually stir in the vinegar. Adding liquid slowly lets the egg yolk and mustard disperse it into tiny droplets. Adding it too fast can overwhelm the emulsifiers, causing the sauce to separate and stay thin.

Swap the mustard

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardthe original
  3. Cucumberfits less well
  4. Cabbagefits less well

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