Commercial mayonnaise – likes, dislikes?

[Deryn]

The only even remotely 'different' ingredient I see in Kewpie (and it isn't identified as such on the site you mentioned) is rice vinegar versus distilled and/or apple cider vinegars in the others - although I guess 'natural flavours' could mean they are including all sorts of other stuff.

That said, I have looked high and low for a mayo that didn't say it was made with 'soybean' or 'canola' oils, especially as the first ingredient.

I used to like Hellman's since that is what I grew up with and if they changed the oil to all grapeseed or all olive or all 'organic' canola even, I would be on board again. I liked their 'olive oil' product but I think it contained way too much of the carrier oil and too little olive.

Recently (as I mentioned on a now-defunct thread the other day) I bought some Sir Kensington's (a non-GMO, mostly organic, WF product I think) and it is made with sunflower oil. It is eggy and lemony (perhaps just a bit too much lemon because it tends to remind me vaguely of Miracle Whip) - a totally different taste than Hellman's which now seems rather bland to me anyway. I like it and even more, I like its ingredient list.

I have eaten Dukes and it was ok. It was a while ago so my memory is a bit vague there but it seemed a bit more eggy than Hellman's but still bland. TJs I have not yet tried but I will in a month or so when I go back down south. The Kewpie one I have seen and considered a few times but will probably never buy - it just seemed too 'cutsie' for me somehow.

Edited August 19, 2015 by Deryn (log)

[blue_dolphin]

This discussion piqued my interest so this AM, I ordered a small container of Duke's.  Amazon tells me that it's scheduled to arrive by tomorrow at 8 PM.  I will compare it to Trader Joe's and my usual, Best Foods.  I'd have to recruit others to make it into a blind or double-blind study.   I'm sure the question would come up and I don't want to admit to anyone that I paid $6.99 for an 8 oz bottle of mayo !

[Porthos]

In our home in southern California it's Best Foods if store bought. For special occasions and vacation even that won't do. For that it's home made (egg yolk, salt, white vinegar, a dash of yellow mustard and corn oil). Miracle whip would get me thrown into the dog house (and deservedly so.)

[slkinsey]

For me the hierarchy of mayonnaise goes:  homemade > Kewpie > Duke's > Hellman's/Cain's > everything else

[slkinsey]

The only even remotely 'different' ingredient I see in Kewpie (and it isn't identified as such on the site you mentioned) is rice vinegar versus distilled and/or apple cider vinegars in the others - although I guess 'natural flavours' could mean they are including all sorts of other stuff.

 

Kewpie contains MSG.

[Smithy]

I've always been a Hellman's/Best Foods fan (except for making my own), but will have to spring for some Duke's to see what the fuss is about - or pick some up when we get south this fall. I'd never thought about adding MSG to my own. Sounds like a nice addition.

[Martin Fisher]

This discussion piqued my interest so this AM, I ordered a small container of Duke's.  

 

Same here....I ordered two 32 ounce containers from Target for $3.49 each.

[liuzhou]

Kewpie contains MSG.

 

I'm more concerned that it contains sugar.

[Shalmanese]

I've been trying out Just Mayo recently, the high tech vegan faux mayonnaise and I might actually like it better than real mayo. I think availability is still spotty but try it out if you get the chance.

[liuzhou]

I'm more concerned that it contains sugar.

 

It has come to my attention that sugar is not listed as an ingredient in the USA. It seems they have different recipes in different territories.

The jar I am looking at is made by Hangzhou Kewpie Foods Co, Ltd, a Sino-Japanese joint venture.

 

Ingredients here are Vegetable Oil, Egg Yolk, Water, Vinegar, Salt, Sugar and various food additives 

including MSG.

Edited August 20, 2015 by liuzhou (log)

[rotuts]

""  32 ounce containers from Target for $3.49 each. ""

 

now there's a careful shopper

 

Im creastfallen

 

I have a Target Card, fee shipping, any amount, and 5 % off

 

= $ 3.3155

 

that's getting in my price range, for 'special occations'

 

maybe I can cancel Amazon ?

 

yep :

 

cancelled Amazon, one dukes from target 'on the way'

 

Kudos DDF

Edited August 20, 2015 by rotuts (log)

[rotuts]

of note :

 

 

no tax !

Edited August 20, 2015 by rotuts (log)

[slkinsey]

 

It has come to my attention that sugar is not listed as an ingredient in the USA. It seems they have different recipes in different territories.

The jar I am looking at is made by Hangzhou Kewpie Foods Co, Ltd, a Sino-Japanese joint venture.

 

Ingredients here are Vegetable Oil, Egg Yolk, Water, Vinegar, Salt, Sugar and various food additives 

including MSG.

 

What's so bad about putting sugar in there?

 

According to their web site, it looks like Kewpie has quite a few subsidiaries and affiliates.

[lindag]

No Southerners here?  I'm told that the most popular brand in the South is Blue Plate.  I tried some and I can't tell it from Best Foods (my favorite).

[liuzhou]

What's so bad about putting sugar in there?

 

According to their web site, it looks like Kewpie has quite a few subsidiaries and affiliates.

 

Sugar is almost certainly more of a health hazard than MSG.

 

Anyway, who wants sweet mayo? Apparently a lot of people, but not me.

[weinoo]

Sugar is almost certainly more of a health hazard than MSG.

 

Anyway, who wants sweet mayo? Apparently a lot of people, but not me.

 

I gotta agree with liuzhou here - even setting aside health habits.  Why the need for sweetened mayo?

[Toliver]

...Why the need for sweetened mayo?

To make it taste more like Miracle Whip.  

[kayb]

Hellman's, hands down (if it's not homemade). I've tried Duke's. Don't see it more than a distant second, and Blue Plate, with which I grew up, would vie for that.

 

Miracle Whip is an abomination.

[slkinsey]

I gotta agree with liuzhou here - even setting aside health habits.  Why the need for sweetened mayo?

 

Who knows how much of the stuff they put in there.  Could just be to make whatever vinegar they're using more like the one used in Japan.

[Jaymes]

You know, growing up, one seldom realizes exactly how your regular childish life is going to influence you in later years.  Now I know how grateful I am not to have been enlisted early on in the mayonnaise wars.  Our fridge was a "everyone's welcome" mayonnaise zone.  My father, about whom I've written previously, was an inventive and imaginative food explorer.  Having spent considerable time as a youth in the kitchen of his mother's restaurant, he turned up his nose at very little.  And when, in later years, his job took him around the world, he saw as one of the greatest benefits of this travel the opportunity to investigate and bring home all manner of exotic foodstuffs.

 

Easiest to transport were the herbs and spices he found in such exotic locales as Tunis, Morroco, Thailand, Saigon, etc.  And the simplest thing to do with this cornucopia of tastes and aromas was to stir them into the mayonnaises he loved to make.  It was easy then to spread them onto an assortment of chicken breasts, fish fillets, breads, crackers - even the occasional weiner that we kids liked cooking over the flames of our gas stove.

 

So, in our fridge at any given time, there was an assortment of various mayos and spreads:  Dad's latest concoctions, whatever was on sale that my thrifty mother bought (often Kraft), and which brands could be purchased in whichever region we were currently living (Have I mentioned that I have moved over 50 times in my life?  At least half of those before I left home for college?). 

 

Regardless as to which mayonnaise you may have loved and found to be superior in every way, most certainly including morally, when you lived back in Wherever, now you find yourself in Germany, Alaska, Panama, Philippines, Kansas, Florida, New York, California...the list goes on and on and on ad infinitum.

 

We did do the Best Foods/Hellman's regional thing, even though a great many folks, including us, do not believe they are identical.  In fact, if you read this whole article you will see that in a recent taste test, only 16% of these particular "food editors" detected no difference:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/09/hellmanns-vs-best-foods-mayo_n_1263492.html

 

In addition to the eclectic assortment of mayonnaises in our fridge, there was always Miracle Whip. 

 

Invented during the pre-war days, it has less-than-half the calories of mayonnaise, which my chubby mother (God love her & I'm sure He did) thought was a good thing.

 

And, besides, although it was certainly way too sweet for turkey sandwiches, and the tongue sandwiches that my father adored, every good Southern cook knows that the tang of Miracle Whip is perfect for the very best deviled eggs.

 

So I had no idea until much later in life that one's choice of mayonnaise would engender such indignant vitriol and scorn.

 

And I am still a bit flummoxed by that. 

 

I no longer have a lot of mayonnaises/spreads in my kitchen.  I'm living by myself now, in a little bachelorette condo at the "Active Senior Retirement Resort" (although I'm basically the only "active" one I've seen).  But I spend most of my time over at my daughter's house babysitting her four small children while she and her husband do battle in the workaday world.  So I know what's in their fridge:  Duke's Light, Blue Plate, Miracle Whip (always gotta be ready to whip up some deviled eggs in case company is coming)...

 

And Hellman's.  But not the Hellman's with which most of you are probably familiar.

 

My daughter teaches Spanish.  And we're living in Texas now.  So we're in the midst of a pretty Latin/Hispanic environment.

 

Of course our Hellman's is this one:

 

http://www.hellmanns.com/product/detail/97901/mayonnaise-with-lime

​

And the lesson I've taken from all this is this:

 

Never mind not talking about politics and religion in polite company.

 

The subject you should not, cannot, absolutely must not, ever, bring up is mayonnaise.

 

 

 

 

.

Edited August 23, 2015 by Jaymes (log)

[gfweb]

Jaymes,strongly agree w Miracle Whip for dev. eggs.  I have to add vinegar to mayo to make it right.

 

I suspect that the scorn is tongue in cheek.

 

Its just mayo after all.

[Jaymes]

Jaymes,strongly agree w Miracle Whip for dev. eggs.  I have to add vinegar to mayo to make it right.

 

I suspect that the scorn is tongue in cheek.

 

Its just mayo after all.

 

"...just mayo"?

 

Heresy, gfweb.

 

Heresy.

Edited August 23, 2015 by Jaymes (log)

[Dave W]

Homemade mayo is my favorite if I can remember to bother to pasteurize my eggs sous vide or sometimes without pasteurization.

After that it's best foods and it's not really close for me.

[Anna N]

Jaymes,

I am not much of a mayo fan but your father's use of it as a vehicle for testing new flavors appears to me to be quite brilliant.

[Toliver]

...The subject you should not, cannot, absolutely must not, ever, bring up is mayonnaise.

 

 

Jaymes, what a wonderful essay on mayo (and Miracle Whip). It makes me miss the heydays of the Daily Gullet on this board.