Saturday 21 May 2011

Make your own Mayo… (Seriously, do it now!)

I’ve posted before about how since we’ve had our own chooks laying our very own delicious fresh eggs, I’ve been experimenting with some egg based cooking… pasta, mayo etc…

And today, I’d like to show you how darn easy it is to make your own delicious Mayonnaise! It’s SO yummy and only takes about 5 minutes!

For the basis of your mayo, you will need one egg and one cup of oil.Some recipes say to just use the egg yolk, but I actually find it yummier with the whole egg (plus who can be bothered separating the egg, and I never know what to do with the leftover white!).

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Ooh look at that amazingly yellow fresh home-laid free range egg yolk! Have I mentioned how much I love having laying hens?

Make sure you use a really light tasting oil. The first time I made it, I used extra virgin olive oil and it was super overpowering. Now I use extra olive oil and it’s perfect. You can also use something like canola or sunflower or vegetable oil. Whatever floats your boat.

These are the other ingredients you will need for your mayo:

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From left:

* Red wine vinegar. I’m pretty sure you could use other types – maybe not plain old white or brown though I could be wrong. Next time I plan to experiment with balsamic.

* Salt. Let’s face it, salt makes everything taste better.

* Lime or lemon juice. I usually use lemon but this time I went for something a little different. You really need something acidic like it though to cut through the oil, and it makes it taste a whole lot better.

* Garlic. This probably isn’t necessary, but in this family we love garlic so much that we go through a jar of minced garlic probably fortnightly.

* Dijon mustard. This is a pretty important ingredient. When I made my first batch, I really didn’t want to put it in because I don’t like the stuff. At all. BUT I had to concede that it just doesn’t taste like mayo without it. And it doesn’t make the mayo taste mustardy at all. So please put it in.

The first thing you need to do (after you crack your egg) is to put a little slosh of red wine vinegar in with the egg, and a couple of twists of the salt grinder. I don’t actually measure anything (except for the oil) when I’m making the mayo, but I reckon I put a bit less than a tablespoon of vinegar.

Beat up your egg. I use a stick-blender, but I have done it by hand with a whisk before and it doesn’t take too long.

Then you need to add your oil. I have heard that when you’re doing it with a stick blender you can add it all at once. I wouldn’t recommend it because the one time I tried that my mayo didn’t thicken at all and I had to tip it down the sink. Epic fail.

My advice is to add it a little bit at a time. Maybe like a 5th of a cup at a time? Then beat it until it’s combined before you add the next bit.

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By the time you’ve added about half of your oil, you’ll find that your mayo has started to thicken and look really mayo-ish.

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Once it starts to look thick, you can add your oil more quickly.

The next thing I do is take it out of stick blender jug and put it into a bowl… it’s time to make it taste good!

I use my wonderful flessenlikker (which is Dutch for jar-licker and is a seriously awesome invention.. every kitchen should have one!) to help me scrape every last bit from the jug.

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Next, you add your flavoursome ingredients. I usually start off with a squirt of lemon (I know very scientific measurements there), a couple twists of salt, a teaspoon of garlic and a teaspoon of Dijon. I usually end up adding more of everything – especially the Dijon. I think I end up with about 3 teaspoons of that.

You really just need to keep tasting it once you get to this bit. Add something, stir it in, taste it… you’ll know what you need more of and your taste will probably be different to mine anyway.

And that’s it! All done!

I promise you, it’s super easy and once you’ve made it and tasted the real thing you’ll never go back to the bought variety!

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Mayana agrees, and won’t let even the smallest amount to go to waste..

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According to various sources, homemade mayo should be stored in the fridge and consumed within about a week (though we’ve been known to eat it within a fortnight).

Enjoy!!

1 comment:

  1. Wow! That doesn't actually look too hard...I've never made mayo before and Masterchef always made it look way complicated! Love Maysi's face at the end :)

    ReplyDelete

Thank you!!

 

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