5 Minute Homemade Mayonnaise
Annabel Hughes cooks, gardens, and forages in the Zambezi Valley on a farm upriver from Victoria Falls in Zambia. Read her blog at www.SavannaBel.com.
This recipe is featured in Making Capers from Nasturtiums in Zambia, Africa
Yield: Just over a cup of mayonnaise, or more if you thin it out with yogurt, crème fraiche, or sour cream.
Note: You will need an immersion blender for this recipe.
Ingredients
- 1 egg
- 237 ml (1 cup) light oil, like sunflower or grape seed
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- Juice of ½ a lemon
- ½ teaspoon Colman’s hot English mustard or 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
- Salt & pepper to taste
Preparation
1. Break the egg into a mixing bowl*
2. Gently pour the oil over the egg, giving it time to rise to the surface.
3. Place your immersion blender directly over the egg yolk and start blending, slowly lifting up the stick from time to time to incorporate more and more of the oil. The end result will be a thick mayonnaise.
4. Mix in the lemon juice, mustard, and salt and pepper with a small spoon until well incorporated.
Here I have provided the method for making basic mayonnaise, but feel free to experiment. You can enhance it any way you wish: incorporating chopped fresh herbs, flavored vinegars, different types of mustard, or spices like paprika, turmeric and saffron. You can also thin it out with plain yogurt, creme fraiche or sour cream.
*Editor’s update: We’ve found that the easiest method for making mayonnaise is to put all ingredients into a glass jar with a large enough opening for the immersion blender and run the blender touching the bottom of jar without moving it about. Lift straight up occasionally after it begins to emulsify to check the consistency.
Annabel Hughes
Annabel Hughes cooks, gardens, and forages in the Zambezi Valley on a farm upriver from Victoria Falls in Zambia. In her blog, SavannaBel, she writes about the joys and challenges of creating, adapting, and executing recipes in a bush kitchen in semi-arid Kalahari sand watered by the Zambezi River. Previously, Annabel worked as a journalist and activist in London and Washington, D.C. She has been published in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, and southern Africa, and has worked for CNN International. Annabel moved back to Africa, where she was born and grew up, at the end of 2012.
Courtesy photo
Read more from Annabel Hughes
