Making mayonnaise.

Mayonnaise - love it or hate it?  I'm a lover of mayo,  dolloped on chips,  on a jacket potato with a slice of blue cheese too,  mixed with mustard,  in sandwiches instead of butter,  it's wonderful stuff.  Well, some of it is.  My first choice is Hellmans usually bought when the supermarket has it on offer as they do now as a buy 1 get the 2nd 50% off.  That's when we stock up.  Second choice comes from a shop further away in Berja,  Mercadona's own brand comes in a plastic square jar which is brilliant for storing herbs and spices in afterwards.  

Then there are some truly dreadful jars that are labelled mayo but don't bear any resemblance to the ones we like,  they have pale colour and a strange whipped texture.  So over the years I have  thought about making mayo but every time I think about it and look for a recipe,  there seems to be too many  drawbacks such as 'take care, do it slowly or it'll separate'   'don't worry if it separates just start with another egg yolk and add your split mix into the next egg....' 

What are you supposed to do with all these egg whites?  Egg white omelettes?  Make meringues?  Surely that's then making something you don't need in order to use up something that's left over - easier to buy a jar of the stuff. 

Until this week!  Friends were here last Saturday and mentioned that they make mayo and use the whole egg so nothing left to use up.  The usual list of ingredients,  sunflower oil as it's not too strongly flavoured,  pinch of salt and pepper,  lemon juice and a pinch of mustard powder.  And everything at room temperature.

Monday after lunch saw us in the kitchen,  John drizzling the oil oh so slowly into the mixing bowl as I whisked and whisked,  and whisked some more.  We added the cup of oil as per recipe,  and tasted.  Quite disappointing actually.  Nothing like Hellmans or any of the shop bought stuff.  But we hadn't added mustard as we only had made mustard not powder.  Could have been the reason for the lack of flavour.

Onto google for ideas,  can I use made mustard or will it cause the mayo to separate?  Yes made mustard is ok,  if no lemon juice add vinegar - red wine or white wine or cider vinegar - any are ok.  So in went the mustard, more whisking and a much better flavour.    

But then.....

......I found the most wonderful quick mayo recipe of all time!  I watched the video in disbelief, watched it again,  took the ipad upstairs to show John and then went to make it this way.  It takes less than 2 minutes.  Really.  Now we've made the second batch and tweaked the taste,  I looked at the ingredients on a jar,  and read the comments from other people who have also made the 2 minute version,  I added a little sugar,  less lemon juice,  and more mustard. 

The recipe is I used is here  - magically fast and easy homemade mayonnaise - do watch the video as it's as quick and easy as shown. 

The original recipe came from here - 2 minute mayonnaise - but this one uses an egg yolk and water whereas the first link is a tweaked version and uses the whole egg.  This link explains also how it works. 

The only things that you need to make sure of are - everything at room temperature (although our lemon juice and mustard came straight from the fridge)  -  and  that the jar you use to mix in is straight sided and only slightly wider than your hand held beater.  Here it's called a batidora,  in some places I think a stick whisk?  But it's clear to see on the video of the first link.

So watch it and try it,  that is if you like mayo as much as I do.