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I have been experimenting with home-made mayonnaise recently. My favourite mayonnaise brands like Hellmann's and Hienz have three distinct taste 'points' that I have tried to achieve:

  1. Tangy
  2. Salty
  3. A distinct 'eggy', or egg-like flavor

While I have been able to achieve the tangy-ness and saltiness through vinegar and salt, I have no idea how manufacturers make their mayonnaise taste so eggy. Do they half boil the eggs before emulsifying the mayo? Or is it achieved through a blend of other spices? I tried adding more raw eggs to my recipe but they don't seem to have any effect.

I appreciate any advice on what I could add to achieve this strong egg-like flavor in my home-made mayo.

Edit: Thanks for the answers so far. I will green tick the answer that worked best for me once I have tried them.

Edit 2: The answer that worked for me was the one that suggested home pasteurising the eggs. I pasteurised the eggs at 135 F for 1hr 15 mins as recommended but I couldn't keep the temperature (it kept fluctuating high and low). I used a small metal sauce pan. The final result was a mayo that had the strong eggy flavor I was looking for, but was also too watery. Still, in the context of this question it did work. Will be finding more ways to keep the eggy flavor while making the mayo thick and stable.

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  • Can you describe the "eggy flavor" you experience and/or want? I think eggs consists for 95% of water, fat and protein (with water taking care of 90% of the 95% for sure). Maybe sulfur? Sulfur is a smell/taste I would associate with (at least boiled) eggs, and it's definitely the strongest smell/taste is able to give off.
    – Willem van Rumpt
    Jul 27, 2017 at 16:37
  • Have you ever tried Hellmann's mayo? I'm finding it difficult to describe. It's the savoury smell/taste of scrambled eggs, I think. Is there a way to introduce sulfur to foods?
    – user60513
    Jul 28, 2017 at 2:10

3 Answers 3

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The sulfur content in the distilled white vinegar used in commercial mayo really emphasizes the egg flavor. If you're using a different vinegar, I think that you should switch to see if it does the trick.

The cooked egg flavor you're looking for comes from pasteurizing the eggs for the mayo. If you've got an immersion circulator, you can do a relatively high-temperature pasteurization for whole eggs in their shell, while not actually cooking them through, and use those for the mayo. There are commercially pasteurized shell eggs available from Davidson's Safest Choice, but they don't taste vastly different from regular eggs— I imagine they pasteurize them at a relatively low temperature for a pretty long time specifically to make them as similar to raw eggs as possible.

Without an immersion circulator, you almost certainly won't have the temperature control you need to pasteurize the eggs without cooking them.

Good luck!

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  • Hi there, thank you for your well written answer. You are saying that the key to achieving the flavor is to pasturise the eggs myself as store-bought pasteurized eggs wont taste the same as home pasteurized eggs?
    – user60513
    Jul 30, 2017 at 0:28
  • @user60513 the 'egg' flavor in commercial mayonnaise differs from home mayonnaise in that it's got a slightly sulfurous cooked flavor. Commercially pasteurized eggs seem to be purposefully pasteurized at a relatively low temperature to avoid this. If you home pasteurized eggs, I'm sure you could get a balance between a more cooked flavor, and an egg still raw enough to emulsify your oil and acid. Cheers!
    – ChefAndy
    Jul 31, 2017 at 5:01
  • Thanks! I don't have a immersion circulator, but I do have a saucepan and a thermometer. Do you think it's still possible to home pasteurise eggs this way?
    – user60513
    Aug 3, 2017 at 1:55
  • Many pasteurization how-tos recommend leaving eggs in 140 degree water for 3 min... horse hockey. That's dangerous advice for the immune disordered. Douglas Baldwin— an excellent resource— says 135 for 75 min. I'm not going to tell you it's physically impossible to do with a pan and thermometer, but it would be difficult. The water really needs to stay within a degree or two, and you'd need something to keep the eggs off the bottom of the pan, or the results will be significantly different. Since you're not immunocompromised and just going for flavor though, maybe try some and see?
    – ChefAndy
    Aug 3, 2017 at 23:22
  • Wow, this really worked. However, I think I 'over-pasteurised' them because when the eggs came out the whites were really cloudy. When I blended it with grapeseed oil, mustard and lemon juice though, I got a mayo that finally had that eggy flavor I was looking for. However, the mayo was 'broken' and watery, I think because I had over-cooked them.
    – user60513
    Aug 13, 2017 at 10:17
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The Organic way:

You're saying that you've tried adding more raw eggs to your recipe, but do not provide any details, so I'm assuming you make mayonnaise with the entire egg (like my aunt does) whereas I only use the yolk of eggs of vegetable and maize-fed chickens and mine tastes much more "eggy" than my aunt's...

So:

  • Buy your own chickens and feed them stale bread, vegetable scraps from your kitchen and add about a cup of maize per week.
  • Use organic eggs from a reputable source (local farmer, ask what they feed to their chickens)
  • Use only the yolk
  • Use even more yolk if that still isn't "eggy" enough

Disadvantage:

My aunt doesn't like my mayonnaise as it's way too rich for her...

The chemical way:

Just buy some Egg yolk, cooked flavour from the Italian (what else?) company FlavourArt and add one drop of that...

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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  • Wow, thanks! I will try just adding the yolk, and see if i can buy organic eggs locally.
    – user60513
    Jul 28, 2017 at 2:11
  • There is a "cooked egg flavor"? Wow.... or rather "yuck".
    – Stephie ♦
    Jul 28, 2017 at 6:55
  • @Stephie Maybe it's for people who like eggs but can't eat them for one reason or another?
    – JAB
    Aug 1, 2017 at 22:38
  • I tried using only the egg yolks, but I think it didn't emulsify properly. It was very watery. I used two egg yolks..
    – user60513
    Aug 3, 2017 at 6:05
  • Go really slow in the beginning and use egg yolk, mustard and oil only and don't use vinegar, but lemon juice.
    – Fabby
    Aug 8, 2017 at 18:31
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Use black salt, kala namak. It have a very strong egg flavour and aroma.

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  • Okay, I will try that once I get my hands on it. I think I found an Indian market near me that sells it. Thanks!
    – user60513
    Jul 28, 2017 at 8:34
  • I finally managed to get some kala namak and will be trying it out soon. Let you know how it turns out.
    – user60513
    Aug 13, 2017 at 10:14
  • Hi, I gave it a try. Added 1/4 teaspoon of black salt (ground with a mortar and pestle until fine) to 1 cup of grapeseed oil and the rest of the ingredients. However, the final product smelt very much like rotten eggs to my other family members and while it did have a strong eggy taste, it was an unpleasant one.. Do you think there's a way to make the flavor less intense? I thought of cooking it on a skillet for a while.
    – user60513
    Aug 14, 2017 at 7:14
  • @user60513 You can try adding less black salt (it now always have the same strong taste) or just try to infuse oil with salt first and then try how strong it is.
    – SZCZERZO KŁY
    Aug 14, 2017 at 15:32

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