In Cloake's own recipe, she adds oil to egg yolks and salt. I have always mixed Dijon mustard with my egg yolk(s) first. (And I have used a pestle and mortar, which have never given me as much grief as she seems to experience with them.) But yesterday I found that I had run out of mustard, so I tried her method. I ended up with a thin yellow liquid - my first ever failure.
The mustard - I generally use half a teaspoon of it with one yolk - helps to emulsify the sauce. As soon as the oil is incorporated with the yolk, the emulsification occurs. But that was not the case when I carried out my sorry experiment. The oil and yolk combined but did not thicken - perhaps I should have used a whisk. Nevertheless, I carried on, rather as if I were in a hole and persisting to use a spade.
I never use a blender. Blades damage the flavour of oil, in my view.
Here is my mayonnaise recipe. Nowadays, I use a ratio of sunflower/groundnut oil to olive oil of 125g/25g.
2 comments:
I am glad I stumbled upon you! Mayo is so simple....I too always use a bit of mustard and I also include a bit of acid like lemon juice or white wine vinegar. I opt for a whisk having made huge batches of the stuff while interning in a restaurant in Chicago.
The acid is good for the flavor - I can't imagine a French Trained Chef leaving it out - and it helps kill any bacteria that may be lurking in your eggs.
Happy cooking!
Thanks, Kenneth. It is simple - but simple here is not a synonym for "can't go wrong".
I'm wary of using the "s" word, because I know that even accomplished cooks can have trouble with particular dishes. I have been lucky that mayonnaise has not been one of my stumbling blocks, except when I left out the mustard.
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