The ‘Tween Months II: Chiles Rellenos

I don’t want to bore you with the joys of the season of anticipation, but really, another word about eggs is in order. You know, eggs, spring, rebirth, etc., etc. Besides, I love them. They are, quite simply, the perfect food, the indispensable protein, leavener, and liquid in your kitchen.

So it’s shocking how badly cooked they always are. I swear, you cannot get a decently cooked egg outside of a five-star hotel with a French chef (and then, it’s a gamble) or that disappearing diner with that near-extinct breed, the gen-u-ine short-order cook who can cook your burger medium-rare, thank you very much, or your scrambleds moist and not a single bit of brown! Since this requires demonstration and practice, no directions here (maybe a video in the future. . .).

But I digress. The subject is eggs in the ‘tween season—those months between winter thaw and the first local produce of the year—, and I feel compelled to share one of my prized recipes for eggs (despite knowing that prized recipes are precisely the ones others don’t share, or leave ingredients out of, including many of my so-called “friends”—you know who you are). And this is a true ‘tween recipe in that it uses the new (eggs) with an inventory draw-down item from last summer, my frozen tomatoes.

The recipe, like all good recipes and food things, has a little story. When I was in my 20s—yes, I was really that old (young?) once—I lived for several years on the Monterey Peninsula in California, and worked halfway between the coast and the Salinas Valley, one of California’s great agricultural areas and, therefore, one of its great Mexican immigrant communities. There was a place in Salinas where we used to go for lunch called Rosita’s Armory Café that had huge and wonderful combination plates for $1.99 that included really, really good chiles rellenos. Turned out, my friend and roommate, Lyle, had grown up in New Mexico with a Mexican cook who made some that were very similar. Lyle knew how to make them, and she taught me. I have taken that basic recipe, fooled with it a bit, and combined it with an authentic Mexican tomato broth, not typically found in even good Mexican restaurants in the United States.

My Chiles Rellenos in Spiced Tomato Broth

This dish makes a wonderful supper for family or friends or for you alone. Like all true Mexican food, it is beautiful to look at and cries out for a party. You can make the sauce and prepare the chiles the day before if you want, and the finished chiles rellenos can be held quite nicely for half an hour in the oven without compromise (it took me 20 years to discover this, so I’ll just save you some time. . .), making this a reasonable choice for entertaining. Apologies to Anne, who begged me not to post this recipe because it was too unique. But when it comes to food, I share.

The chiles

1 roasted, peeled, and seeded fresh poblano pepper per person
1 large brown RI egg, separated, per person, and 1 for the bowl
2 or 3 slices queso blanco or good-quality California Monterey Jack cheese, about 1/8” thick x 3” long (mozzarella, goat, or Philadelphia brand brick cream cheese can be used too) per chile
1 1/2 tea flour for each egg (when making a large quantity, you can cut this down)
salt-big pinch per egg

lard for frying (no substitutes please! You may as well eat at Taco Bell! Long article on the virtues and necessities of lard for everything to come in future editions!)

To roast the peppers, place them whole a few inches from a hot broiler or on the grill, turning occasionally, until blistered all over; they should char somewhat but be careful not to burn or they will be ruined (“toast,” I almost said). If you are just doing one or two, your toaster oven works fine. Place in a plastic bag to steam for a while, and when cool enough to handle, rinse the skin off under running water. Gently pull on the stem to remove, hopefully bringing most of the seeds with it. Remove any others by rinsing under running water, and pull away any big fleshy veins. Try really hard not to tear them. Dry between layers of paper towels. When dry, insert a few pieces of cheese into the opening; if pepper is torn, try to fold the pepper edges over each other. Cover and set aside.

Mix the egg yolks with the flour and salt; it will be pasty. In a separate bowl, beat the whites until they form soft peaks: keep them moist and dry/don’t let them break. Fold into the egg yolk mixture in two or three batches, keeping a light touch. Once you’ve done this, you should cook the chiles or the batter will separate and become watery.

In a large frying pan, melt enough lard over medium heat to give you about 1/8” inch of fat (chiles rellenos are not to be deep-fried, ever); Goya or Armour brand is fine if you don’t have a farm source. With a large spoon, drop and spread an oval of batter into the pan, making them large enough to form a “bed” for your chiles, according to their size. Place a chile on top of each oval, and cook over medium heat until golden brown on the bottom and the base is partly dried. Top each chile with more batter and, with supreme confidence, flip them neatly, adding a little more lard to the pan if necessary and corralling any batter that threatens to run away. Don’t worry about them merging together or having imperfect shapes; just sever them at the seam with the spatula as needed and enjoy the informal character of the dish. Sometimes I tip them on their sides to cook them a bit more evenly.

When the chiles rellenos are evenly golden, remove them and place them in a large, shallow serving dish, such as a gratin or Italian pasta dish, filled about half-way with the spicy broth. Serve the chiles over rice, and spoon broth over all.

The broth

This should be thin without being watery, a broth with body and texture, not a sauce. You want it to be absorbed a little into the chiles rellenos and the rice.

1 medium-small sweet onion, such as Vidalia, chopped
2 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped fine
2 T lard
5 or 6 whole frozen tomatoes, defrosted (in summer, of course, use fresh), or 1 28-oz can Italian plum tomatoes
6 whole cloves
8 whole peppercorns
1 bay leaf
4” piece cinnamon , broken in three
¼ tea dried thyme
2-3 cups pork, ham, or light chicken stock (see Note)

Briefly whiz the tomatoes in the food processor and set aside.

Melt lard and sauté onion and garlic quickly over medium-high heat. Throw in the spices and herbs and stir for a minute or two. Pour the tomato into onion-garlic mixture, blending well, and cook for a minute. Add 2 c. broth, reduce heat, and simmer the mixture for 20 minutes or so to meld the flavors; add more broth or water to as needed to achieve a consistency that is thin and brothy but has a some body to it. I like to leave the whole spices in, for both the rustic look and the flavor. If stored overnight, it may be necessary to thin it again.

NOTE: If you do not have homemade stock, Goya’s Sazon brand ham bouillon powder works quite well; use 1 small packet only, as it’s strong; add additional water to thin.

Rhubarb, Maple Syrup, Eggs: Spring At Last

 

 

No one who lives in Rhode Island needs to be told that winter, and early spring, was record-breaking cruel and unusual this year. And while it’s not exactly summer yet, there’s reason to hope that, with May around the corner, there really cannot be another devastating storm—at least not until hurricane season. Four whole months away! Let’s eat!

The edible signs of spring are late, but they are there. The maple syrup is in, there is nice rhubarb at the market, and the hens are laying eggs. Either one alone is cause for celebration. Rhubarb has become one of my late-in-life pleasures; pretty as it is (and I am a sucker for eye-appeal), I would not touch it despite being surrounded by rhubarb fanciers in my youth. I love it, as did my grandmother, stewed with sugar and eaten plain from a bowl, or stirred into yogurt. Maple syrup, in contrast, is a life-long friend; in the “don’t leave home without it” view of an essential item, I have small bottles of it in my glove compartment, my purse….have syrup, will travel. In Rhode Island it goes over countless johnnycakes, naturally, but also into countless sweet and savory dishes and my maple syrup whiskey sours. And eggs, a perfect food in its own right, are a sign of resurrection from the dead of winter like no other.

Choosing one over the other is too hard, and I’m one of those people who believe that playing favorites is unjust, so: equal time for all. Fairness is very satisfying, as this little tart attests. Of course, fair does not necessarily mean low-cal, low-fat, or low-carb, or low anything. In other words, fairness in baking is a universal good: it’s a delicious treat, one you deserve after the most brutal winter and early spring in 200 years. Restitution on a fork.

Rhode Island Maple-Rhubarb Tart

You can make this over a few days if you wish, making the dough and/or the purée the day before. The tart shell must be pre-baked blind. Makes one 9” tart; serves 6-8.

Rhubarb Purée

3 generous cups fresh rhubarb (about 1 lb of medium-size stalks, washed and trimmed)
¼ cup fresh-squeezed lemon juice
¾ cup sugar
¼ tea cardamom
1/3 cup Grade B maple syrup

Cook the first 4 ingredients for 5 minutes; add the maple syrup and cook about 5 minutes more, taking care not to scorch, until thick and coherent. Put it through a strainer. You will have a scant cup of purée. You can refrigerate it for making the curd later, or proceed.

Rhubarb Curd

1 cup rhubarb purée
Zest of 1 lemon
3 large egg yolks (reserve whites)
1 large whole egg
1 T maple syrup
2 drops red food coloring (optional)
12 T unsalted butter
2 T heavy cream

In a chef’s or other heavy pan with sloping sides, stir together the purée, lemon zest, egg and egg yolks, and maple syrup; I like to use a wooden spoon but you may prefer a whisk. Over low heat, stir/whisk the mixture continuously until thick and it just begins to bubble. Be careful not to curdle it; you may wish to do this over simmering water in a double-boiler. Check the color; if you don’t like it, you can add a drop or two of red food coloring; stir completely to incorporate.

Remove from the heat and beat the butter in, tablespoon by tablespoon, stirring until it disappears; put it back over low heat from time to time if needed. Stir in the heavy cream.

Pâte Sucrée

4 oz (1/4 lb, or 1 stick) unsalted butter, partially softened
¼ cup sugar
1 large egg yolk
1 ½ cups a-p flour
¼ tea salt
1 T heavy cream

Place the softish but still cool butter in a standing mixer and beat a minute or two till soft; scrape down the bowl and add the sugar, beat a minute, and then add the yolk and beat until incorporated. Add the flour and salt, beat until it comes together (it will still be a bit crumbly), then add the cream and beat a few seconds until smooth. Wrap in plastic and chill for several hours or overnight (dough can also be frozen).

Remove the dough and soften enough to roll by cutting it into several pieces and kneading them with your hand, then forming them back together into a disk. Tap the disk with your rolling pin, then roll it out quickly on a floured surface; once soft, it gets really soft. Lift the dough carefully into your tart pan, trimming the overhang to about ½”, and turn this overhand to the inside against the edge. Chill again for 15 minutes or so. Preheat the oven to 375 F while it chills.

Remove the pan and flute the edge or press it with a fork. Prick the bottom with fork, and line the pan with foil and some weight (beans, rice, etc.) or a smaller-size pan. Bake 10-12 minutes; remove the foil/weight or pan, and bake another 5 minutes or so, until golden. Cool on a rack.

Finishing the Tart

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Pour/spread the rhubarb curd into the baked pastry shell. Bake the tart for about 12-15 minutes, until firm. You could now serve this with maple whipped cream made with good heavy cream, or finish it with:

Maple Meringue

3 egg whites, reserved from making curd
¼ tea cream of tartar
2 T Grade B maple syrup
1/2 cup sugar

Beat the whites at medium speed with the cream of tartar and the syrup until thick and foamy. Raise the speed to high and beat, gradually adding the sugar, until the mixture forms marshmallow-fluffy, shiny peaks.

If you do not have a kitchen torch, heat the broiler. Lightly oil the inside and rim of a flan ring the size of the tart pan or an inch smaller, and place it, oiled rim down, on the tart. Spoon the meringue into the ring, spreading it neatly and evenly out to the edges with a rubber spatula. Dip the spatula into the center and around the circumference to pull soft peaks out of the meringue. (If you don’t have a flan ring, just pile the meringue on.) Place the tart under the broiler until lightly brown (or use your torch). Put the tart in the freezer for 30 minutes (or up to 4 hours) before serving). Cut firmly and cleanly (do not saw) with a sharp knife.

       

Holiday Breads I: Challah

 

I confess that sometimes I forget I have a blog, and by the time I remember, I’ve made something nice, and it’s already done, and there are no in-progress photos. So I skip it as a subject for the blog.

This time, though, is different. Everyone should know how to make a good, impressive—and very easy—bread for the holiday table. Something simpler and less expensive than, say, a great stollen or panettone (which, shockingly, some people don’t like). So even though I forgot to take photos, it’s that time of year and you may need or want this recipe for challah. I’ll do my best at directions for the braiding. (I also made another bread today, but had already frozen it and only had a half-eaten slice with butter on it to photograph . . . too questionable even by my low standards for what constitutes food worth looking at.)

Why all the breads? Aside from the fact that I love bread, of course? My department is having a holiday pot luck lunch this week, and my contribution is a bread basket. There will be a wonderful New England 100% whole wheat brown bread with raisins and nuts—the one already in the freezer; a huge fougasse in the shape of a Christmas tree; my buttermilk dinner rolls to satisfy the Southerners; some cornmeal crackers; a few loaves of French bread made with poolish and a little whole wheat; and this challah. I have also been pressed to bring one of last year’s contributions again, the ever-versatile and vibrant apricot chutney.

Challah is a traditional Jewish bread served at holidays in various shapes, most notably braided, but also wound into a smart turban or little knotted rolls. My father used to call it Jewish egg bread when I was little, and that about describes it. It is eggy, but contains less egg, butter, and sugar than many enriched doughs, giving it a finer texture and making it suitable for sandwiches, French toast, and eating with butter. Unlike some of its more decorated cousins, it falls squarely into the bread rather than the dessert category. This is, I think, why most people like it. While I am a totally egalitarian bread eater, welcoming all comers, I am very fond of challah. It makes a great ham sandwich. Ironic, I know.

Challah

One of the easiest ways to impress your boyfriend’s mother, or make her fear you will replace her. Freeze the whites for later use. Makes 1 huge loaf.

1 package dry yeast
2 tsp sugar
¼ cup warm water

4 ½ cups bread flour, more if needed
2 tea salt
2 large eggs
1 large egg yolk
2 T unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 cup lukewarm water

1 large egg yolk
poppy seeds

Sprinkle the sugar and yeast into the ¼ cup water, stir, and set aside for a few minutes. Butter a half-sheet pan.

Beat the eggs and 1 egg yolk with the butter. Sift the flour and salt into the yeast mixture. Add the egg-butter mixture and the cup of water. Mix until blended and turn out onto a floured board. Knead until smooth, incorporating a little more flour if needed, about 6 or 7 minutes.

Place into a large greased bowl and cover with plastic wrap to rise until double, about an hour. Punch down and let rise again, about another hour.

Preheat the oven to 375 F.

Divide the dough into two pieces, one about 1/3 of the dough, one about 2/3. Set the smaller piece aside, covered. Pat the larger piece out to about 12 inches and cut it into thirds lengthwise, and roll the pieces into ropes with slightly tapered ends. Place them parallel to each other, an inch or so apart, then join them at the top, tucking under the ends. Braid, crossing from left over the center, then right over the left (now in the center) and so on, always crossing alternate sides over the piece that lands in the center. Pull the ends together at the bottom and tuck under. You can do the braiding on the counter and transfer it to the buttered baking sheet, or do it directly on the sheet.

Repeat the braiding procedure with the smaller piece. Make a slight indentation down the length of the braid on the sheet, and brush with water. Place the smaller braid firmly on top, integrating the ends. Mix the final egg yolk with a few drops of water; brush the bread gently all over and sprinkle lightly with poppy seeds. Bake in the middle of the oven for about 45-50 minutes, until it is a lovely mahogany color and is firm at the intersections of the braids. Remove to a rack to cool.

 

                                                   

Eggs: They’re What’s for Dessert

One of the few signs of spring around here is the appearance along the roadside of signs for local eggs. Most of our local eggs are brown, but we of course have white and increasingly will see lovely pale green eggs. Occasionally, as in the photo below right, they are packaged together, sort of like assorted chocolates.
Last year I provided excruciatingly detailed information on eggs and a recipe for mayonnaise. So I thought I’d skip the lecture and talk about something you don’t hear about too much: eggs for dessert. This is not a new idea by any means, as a perusal of my old cookery books shows. And if you think about it a minute, most of the desserts we eat—puddings, cakes—start out with eggs and sugar. With eggs for dessert, you just stop there. Brilliant!
Of course, everyone loves a good soufflé. That is certainly one dessert that can be made with eggs. It begins with a base such as pastry cream or fruit puree, and builds from there. But that’s a bit more than I am talking about. I really am talking about eggs and sugar—sweet omelets.
There are two kinds of sweet omelet: one plain, and very much a sweetened and sometimes flavored version of a regular omelet; and one souffléd, in which the whites are beaten and folded in. Both kinds have pretty much disappeared from the table in this country. I have no idea why, unless it’s the same reason that so many other things have disappeared from our tables: it didn’t lend itself to commercial production, and thus was lost to the generation that grew up on prepared food. Although while that might explain the disappearance of the souffléd omelet, a plain sweet omelet is no different from any other, and we all know we still eat way too many of those.
One could also argue that the sweet omelet is primarily a European thing, something of German, Viennese, or French provenance. My 1960s Mapie, Countess de Toulouse-Lautrec cookbook contains recipes for no less than eight simple sweet omelets. One contains angelica and has a butter sauce with grapes and rum. Yum.
But we Americans are not off the hook. My Gold Medal Flour cookbook—you can’t get more American than that—from 1910 has a recipe for a sweet omelet. And it is a souffléd one.
So no excuses. Try some eggs for dessert. Here are two versions of a souffléd omelet. If you fill your omelet, use your very best homemade, fluid-but-not-too-runny preserves.
Souffléd Omelet I
I first made this recipe at Roberta Dowling's Cambridge School of Culinary Arts, where I did my professional chef training. It is very similar to the Gold Medal recipe, and is very good. Serves 4-6.
5 eggs, separated
¼ cup sugar
¼ cup sifted flour
2 T unsalted butter
Preserves of your choice (I prefer cherry or apricot)
10x for garnish
Preheat the oven to 325 F. Beat egg whites stiff; fold in yolks, sugar, and flour gently. In a 9” frying pan, heat the butter and add the omelet mixture. Bake until slightly yellow, about 15 minutes. Fill with preserves; fold; and transfer to a platter. Sprinkle with 10x and serve.
Souffléd Omelet II
The confectioner’s sugar produces a softer texture, with a somewhat loose center; regular sugar yields a firmer omelet. Serves 3-4.
3 eggs, separated
1/3 cup 10x sugar, sifted and packed, or ¼ cup granulated sugar
½ tea vanilla
Pinch salt
1 ½ T flour
2 T homemade cherry or apricot preserves
Additional 10x to garnish
Preheat oven to 325 F. Beat the yolks and sugar with an electric beater; stir in the flour, salt, and vanilla. Beat the egg whites until stiff. Fold them, half at a time, into the egg yolk mixture. Using a large spoon, fill a buttered and sugared pie plate or small gratin with the egg mixture. Bake about 10-12 minutes, until firm to the touch and a skewer comes out clean. Sprinkle with confectioner’s sugar and serve immediately with the preserves or a fruit sauce (you can also put the preserves into the omelet for cooking: spoon half the batter into the pan, distribute the preserves, top with the remaining batter, and bake).

"Brown eggs are local eggs. . .

…and local eggs are fresh!” This jingle played over and over on the radio in the 1960s, and has, like all things vintage, recently made a comeback.

The eggs themselves, of course, have never gone out of style. Indeed, the Rhode Island Red hen, developed during the mid-nineteenth century in the Village of Adamsville, Little Compton, a stone’s throw from where I live, is an international celebrity. A so-called “dual purpose” chicken (eggs plus meat), the RI Red is known the world-round as a hardy, non-brooding (no one likes a depressed chicken), highly productive bird, yielding up to 300 eggs per year. We are terribly proud of our brown eggs here in Rhode Island. This includes me, raised on white eggs in New Jersey, and skeptical at first.

It’s an irrational pride, of course. Brown eggs are no different from white eggs, except for shell color. Red-eared chickens lay brown eggs and white-eared chickens lay white. The chemist tells us that, nutritionally, they are identical. Their greater expense is because of the larger size, and greater appetite, of the hens, not for any difference in quality. This is what the experts say. I say, don’t buy anything else. Brown eggs are local eggs, and local eggs are fresh. And the ones from your neighborhood farm have likely been fed differently, perhaps allowed to wander around free, and do taste better. Ask your farmer if his chickens are pastured, what he feeds them, and (for the reasons discussed below), when the eggs were laid.

Buy only clean, large, fresh eggs with intact shells. When you buy in a market, eggs will be labeled according to either U.S. Dept of Agriculture standards, or state standards; that is, not all eggs are USDA graded—in fact, only about a third of eggs sold. If you don’t see the USDA shield on your carton, then they are not. What this means is that your state may not require that you be informed where they were packed, or when. Almost all eggs carry a “sell by,” “good until,” or “expiration” date, but that is different (perhaps as long as 45 days) from the packing date, which is usually within a very few days of laying and is your key to freshness. The packing date is known as the “Julian Date” and is a three-digit code for the day of the year, from 001 to 365. So a Julian Date of 030 is January 30; if you buy your eggs on February 5, you know they were packed six days earlier, and laid perhaps 7-14 days before purchase. The packing location is a number beginning with P, which can be decoded at: http://www.ams.usda.gov/plantbook/Query_Pages/PlantBook_Query.asp. You can readily convert a Julian date at: http://www.ams.usda.gov/poultry/consumer/InterpretPackDate.htm. If the eggs you buy at the market lack these dates, contact your legislator and say you want them included in state standards; they do not translate into a cost difference.

Eggs are a natural topic for the ‘tween months, what with spring, rebirth, etc., and the reappearance of fresh eggs at the roadside. But they are a worthy subject in their own right, a perfect food that is at once the indispensable protein, leavener, and liquid in your kitchen. At only about 75 calories each, they are packed with nutrients, including 6 grams of the highest quality protein, complete with all essential amino acids, of any food.

In addition to their simple and unadorned selves, very fresh eggs are perfect for soufflés, meringues, angel-food cake, and other good things requiring volume achieved by incorporating air into egg whites. Whether you use an electric mixer, a copper bowl and balloon wisk, or an old rotary beater, the transformation from cloudy, viscous liquid to opaque foam to shiny white fluff is truly magical. Very fresh eggs are also right for perfectly shaped, tender hard-boiled eggs (although they are harder to peel than older eggs, new eggs are “full,” not having yet lost some of their volume, so result in perfect ovals with centered yolks), which of course means egg salad or deviled eggs. Which brings us to mayonnaise, another fresh-egg essential.

Mayonnaise is a stable emulsion made by slowly beating oil into egg yolk and/or whole egg mixed with a small amount of acid—lemon juice or vinegar— and salt. You may see recipes calling for dry or prepared mustard, which some say assists in the emulsion, but I never use it in my basic mayo; you can always add prepared mustard to the finished product if you want it for, e.g., deviled eggs. Ditto for pepper. Mayonnaise is one of the “mother sauces” of cuisine, so-called because it forms the basis of numerous sauces and dressings, including classics like sauce remoulade or sauce ravigote.

During the summer, now hot on our heels, you will need loads of mayonnaise—for making potato salad with newly dug potatoes, creamy salad dressings like ranch or green goddess or thousand island, tartar sauce for lightly flour-dusted and fried scallops, sublime chicken salad, garlicky aioli for dipping vegetables or spreading on fish for grilling (as in the last post), and, of course, for tomato sandwiches and the divine summer BLT. You may as well make some right now.

Making Mayonnaise

You can make mayonnaise by hand with a whisk or rotary beater (although a beater takes both hands and makes it hard to add oil steadily), in a blender, or with an immersion blender or food processor. A food processor is the most sensible tool, and I particularly like a “mini” food processor for mayonnaise because they are just the right capacity for making a small quantity. Mine recently died, so I am using my full-size processor; just be very careful at the outset to get your emulsion going when you use a full-size processor to make fewer than 2 cups.

Most mayo recipes call for two fresh, large egg yolks for each 1-1/4 cups oil, but you can use only 1 yolk, or even 1 whole egg, or both, and any oil or combination of oils. It all depends on the taste and texture you are after: experiment to see what you like. Similarly, your acid can be lemon juice, any vinegar (even balsamic, which will produce a brownish but tasty product for flavorful foods), or combination, depending on what you’re going for. (Mayo in the photo was made with the yolk/whole combo, cider vinegar, and corn oil). I don’t recommend using 100% olive oil, particularly extra-virgin, unless making aioli; it is too strong, to say nothing of the cost. Even for aioli, a light olive oil mixed with another relatively neutral-tasting oil yields a more palatable product for some tastes; again, experiment. Keep your addition of vinegar or lemon while making mayonnaise to perhaps 2 teaspoons for these proportions while making it; once the emulsion is stable, you can thin or flavor your mayonnaise with more lemon or vinegar if you like. If your mayonnaise breaks at any point while making it, stop. Try whisking in a teaspoon of hot water (a method of thinning and bringing together the finished product as well), or use the standard fix: Treat the broken mayo as oil/vinegar, and start over: beat another egg yolk, and beat the broken mayo slowly in. It will come back together. But “breaking” is largely an issue of handmade mayonnaise; the food processor is virtually fool-proof.

Food safety issues around mayonnaise are associated with eggs themselves, and the risk of salmonella infection. You minimize this risk by buying top-quality, properly produced eggs. If your eggs are fresh, whole, clean, shell eggs bought from a reliable, preferably pastured, source and are stored and handled properly, mayonnaise presents no greater, and perhaps slightly less, risk than other raw or minimally cooked (below 140 F) egg products, such as some custards, meringue, or even a sunny-side up egg. In fact, mayonnaise is acid, and salmonella do not thrive in acid environments; if your eggs are safe, your mayonnaise is likely to be, too.

My Standard Mayonnaise

This makes approximately 1 ½ cups. Some variations are listed below the recipe.

1 yolk and 1 whole egg (large)
½ scant tea salt
2 ½ tea cider vinegar
1 ¼ cups corn oil

½ tea boiling water to finish

Have all ingredients at room temperature. Place egg yolk/egg in food processor with salt and half the vinegar. Pulse briefly. Through the feed tube, begin dribbling oil drop by drop with motor running, pausing from time to time to give it a chance to be absorbed. As the emulsion comes together, you can add the oil in a steadier stream, but still slowly. About half-way through, add half the remaining vinegar. When all oil has been added and you have a beautiful, creamy, glossy emulsion, add the remaining vinegar and ½ teaspoon boiling water, and pulse briefly. Taste for seasoning; if it needs more salt, dissolve a little in another ½ tea of boiling water and blend in. If not using immediately, store in glass jar in the refrigerator; properly made, it will mound softly but firmly. Homemade mayonnaise keeps well for up to two weeks, but is best if used sooner. Some permutations:

Herb mayonnaise: Use lemon instead of vinegar. Add 4 T chopped mixed fresh herbs, such as tarragon, chervil, parsley, chives, basil, or mint, to your taste, plus a little black pepper and extra lemon. You can add them at the beginning or to the finished product (preferred). Good for fish, vegetable, egg or cold meat salad, and tomato or onion sandwiches (yes, onion sandwiches).

Chutney mayonnaise: Mix a few tablespoons of homemade or store-bought chutney into a cup of mayonnaise for chicken salad. Nice twist for a Waldorf salad, too.

Tartar sauce: To one cup mayo, add 1 T each finely chopped sweet onion and parsley, and 2 T chopped dill pickles; stir in a little lemon juice and salt to taste. An optional addition is 1 T chopped capers. A classic for fried shellfish.

Other thoughts: Anything that will infuse flavor and not destabilize the emulsion can be added: fruit syrup or jam, horseradish, maple syrup, relish, chopped dried fruit, chopped nuts, grated cheese. Mayonnaise sweetened with minted fruit puree or syrup and lightened with whipped cream can be very nice on a cold, juicy fruit salad.

American Aioli

Makes 1 generous cup of thick sauce, suitable for a dip, my favorite use for aioli; it will absorb substantially more oil if you want it more fluid. You can also control texture with the water and lemon. For aioli, I prefer to form the emulsion without acid so I can control the taste and texture better, but you can add it with the yolks if you prefer. The soaked breadcrumbs of traditional Provencal aioli is omitted—this is really a garlic mayonnaise.

3 very fresh cloves garlic
2 egg yolks (all yolks preferred for this)
¾ cup extra-virgin (or lighter) olive oil
¼ cup corn oil
¼ tea salt
2 tea lemon juice and 1-2 T boiling water to finish

Crush/mash garlic to a paste with salt with a mortar and pestle, and add this to yolks in the food processor. Pulse briefly, then follow above directions for adding oil. When finished, blend in the lemon juice and boiling water to achieve the flavor and texture you want. Excellent with fish (salt cod is traditional), vegetables (particularly barely blanched carrots and green beans), fried foods of all kinds, or cold meat.