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I took my older daughter MK back to university in Canada last week, where we saw my mum and sister. Michelle had made aioli and gave us a jar. We loved it!
An emulsion of olive oil and egg yolks, aioli has the consistency of homemade mayonnaise, but with loads of garlic and, unlike mayonnaise, no egg whites. Also, the mayonnaise recipes I’ve read call for vegetable oil, or a mix of vegetable and olive oils. This calls for olive oil only. These differences result in an almost addictive substance. I have nothing against mayonnaise, but I would never scarf down half a jar of it. I pretty much did that after I made this (and had snapped a sufficient number of pictures for my post).
You can use aioli as a spread or dip. It tastes fantastic with my sourdough crackers. But I have to admit that although this turned out very well, Michelle’s was better. She used freshly harvested garlic from her garden and freshly laid eggs from her hen, The Chicken. My ingredients were fresh, but not that fresh.
Michelle found this recipe in The Silver Palate Cookbook. I halved it, thinking we couldn’t eat it all. Also, I didn’t want four egg whites on my hands. Egg whites mean meringues. And I can’t have piles of those sitting around.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 tbsp minced garlic
- 1 tsp lemon juice
- 2 egg yolks
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 1/4 cups extra virgin olive oil
Directions
Yields a scant 1 1/2 cups
1. Put the garlic, lemon juice, egg yolks and salt in the bowl of a food processor.
3. Transfer to a glass jar and refrigerate. The mayonnaise recipe I use recommends storing that for up to week and this is similar. So seven days seems like a good guideline.
Zero waste
I’m very lucky to have access to several stores with good bulk bins. That makes zero-waste and plastic-free cooking fairly easy. I just have to organize my jars and cloth bulk bags for my purchases before I leave for the store.
I bought the olive oil for my aioli in bulk at Whole Foods in a glass jar I brought. The eggs came from the farmer’s market and the vendor reuses cartons, so I return those to her. The salt was originally in a box, but it’s almost gone and I have a jar of bulk salt I’ll use next. I bought the garlic and lemon without packaging. The lemon did have an annoying sticker on it, but I save those for little decorating projects.
Aioli
Yields a scant 1 1/2 cups
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 tbsp minced garlic
- 1 tsp lemon juice
- 2 egg yolks
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 1/4 cups extra virgin olive oil
Directions
1. Put the garlic, lemon juice, egg yolks and salt in the bowl of a food processor.
2. Run while slowly drizzling in the olive oil. Aioli will thicken up as you add the oil. If necessary, continue to process to thicken.
3. Transfer to a glass jar and refrigerate. Eat within about seven days.