Preserved Lemon Aioli

[BadRabbit]

Though I've made fully successful Mayos more times than I can count, I was afraid that technique may have been rushed on the first attempt, and I took more care afterwards. Certainly the final one was a fully successful emulsion until I added the lemon. I personally find olive oil to be less stable once refrigerated, since it will partially solidify, but it should have worked fine for this purpose, where I was making it fresh right before the meal.

AAQuesada, that is interesting about the preserved lemon storage. I'll probably do that soon to save space.

I'm still interested in ideas about other stabilizers. Something I often (but not always) do is add some amount of prepared mustard to the initial emulsion, which Peterson says strengthens it. I didn't do that this time, not having anything suitably mild on hand and not wanting to compete with the garlic & lemon. Anybody think this might have made a difference?

Most prepared mustards have pectin or other ingredients that make emulsions more stable.

[Chris Hennes]

Hard to tell, but again, a single egg yolk has a LOT of emulsification power. I regularly make mayonnaise without anything but egg yolk, lemon juice, salt and oil, and it holds together fine. It seems to me that it's possible that it's actually some combination of salt and pH that form the problem. The paper I just read, while not about this type of emulsion, examines the affect of both salt and pH on their emulsions, and find that they can work in concert to destabilize an emulsion. So perhaps it's both the vinegar and the salt that were the problem: you could try replacing the vinegar with water to check that variable. You have already tried removing the salt (from the lemon) and that emulsion worked. If the salty but less acidic emulsion works, than you know it's the combination of the two factors that was the real problem.

[raybeezbabee]

I make aiolis and various emulsions many, many times a day. I am not a home cook. There is no problem here. Just use proper mayonaisse technique, use a light oil, fold in the lemon rind and you're done. I still can't tell why this is a topic of conversation.

[thirtyoneknots]

I make aiolis and various emulsions many, many times a day. I am not a home cook. There is no problem here. Just use proper mayonaisse technique, use a light oil, fold in the lemon rind and you're done. I still can't tell why this is a topic of conversation.

Perhaps due to a rejection of your condescending presupposition that my technique is deficient. This was not my first time making mayonnaise, nor making it with olive oil alone. It was, however, the first time in many years I was unable to create a stable emulsion, and the only new addition was the salt-cured lemon peels. If you don't think trying to figure it out is a good use of your time there are plenty of other ongoing discussions for you to participate in.

[Chris Hennes]

Right, it seems clear this is not a technique issue. I'd be very curious to know the results of an experiment with the acidity (since it's clear from both your original post and from the fact that raybeezbabee blanches his preserved lemon before using that salt is at least part of the problem here).

[thirtyoneknots]

I'm curious too, but I'm sort of reluctant to potentially waste another cup of olive oil when I no longer have much application for the aioli, even if it turns out successful. I have pomace oil and plain veg oil but that would be another confounding variable, wouldn't it?

[Chris Hennes]

I just made a mayonnaise with a healthy splash of a 7% acidity white wine vinegar and no salt: it came together fine, but I'm going to give it a few minutes. Then I'll add an overdose of salt and see if anything happens.

[Chris Hennes]

OK: so here's a data point. I just made a quite tart mayonnaise using a 7% white wine vinegar and vegetable oil (no salt). Then I took 50g of the mayo and added 5g of salt, resulting in a overly salty emulsion that took under five minutes to break. The remaining (now properly-salted) mayo is sitting next to it on the counter and is just fine. So at the least I think this confirms the truth of Fantastic Mr Fox's statement above, that too much salt will break a mayonnaise-type emulsion. There are of course other variables at work here, but I'd be willing to bet it turns out that the salt is the only culprit.

[thirtyoneknots]

On 1327961866' post='1860686, Chris Hennes said:

OK: so here's a data point. I just made a quite tart mayonnaise using a 7% white wine vinegar and vegetable oil (no salt). Then I took 50g of the mayo and added 5g of salt, resulting in a overly salty emulsion that took under five minutes to break. The remaining (now properly-salted) mayo is sitting next to it on the counter and is just fine. So at the least I think this confirms the truth of Fantastic Mr Fox's statement above, that too much salt will break a mayonnaise-type emulsion. There are of course other variables at work here, but I'd be willing to bet it turns out that the salt is the only culprit.

Bam. Very cool.

[AAQuesada]

If you are just putting in the lemon peel you shouldn't be adding any salt even w/o blanching. I make preserved lemon aioli all the time some time with preserved lemon puree, sometimes with brunoise of preserved lemon. It's always with home made PL's and have never had it break for any reason other than rushing too much and no using good technique. After all you are filleting the PL and removing the white and pulp right? The yellow shouldn't hold enough salt to cause a problem???

I am not saying salt won't break the emulsion but you shouldn't have enough salt on the PL to cause a problem even if you use excess salt in the curing process.

[thirtyoneknots]

If you are just putting in the lemon peel you shouldn't be adding any salt even w/o blanching. I make preserved lemon aioli all the time some time with preserved lemon puree, sometimes with brunoise of preserved lemon. It's always with home made PL's and have never had it break for any reason other than rushing too much and no using good technique. After all you are filleting the PL and removing the white and pulp right? The yellow shouldn't hold enough salt to cause a problem???

I am not saying salt won't break the emulsion but you shouldn't have enough salt on the PL to cause a problem even if you use excess salt in the curing process.

Hmmm...no I did not remove the pith. I'm not well-versed in using preserved lemon and I didn't recall seeing to do that. I just scraped out the pulp and minced the rest. I have little doubt that the pithy peel has enough salt to duplicate Chris' results. Any hints on how best to remove the pith? These are Meyer lemons, so the whole thing is relatively thin.

[thirtyoneknots]

I should perhaps restate that I added perhaps more of the lemon than would have been necessary to achieve a good flavor, again not being particularly familiar with it on the cooking end--the eating end is another matter.

[AAQuesada]

I fillet it like taking the skin off of a fish yellow side down on the cutting board, and with a sharp flexible knife like a boning knife, take off as much of the white as you can. Doesn't have to be perfect myer's aren't that pithy anyway.