{"id":206417,"title":"Authentic Aioli Recipe","modified":"2026-11-14T19:46:59+01:00","plain":"A raw Proven\u00e7al sauce of pounded garlic, egg yolks and extra virgin olive oil, emulsified in a mortar.\n\n\n\nA piece of poached salt cod, still warm, steaming potatoes, a few carrots, and in the middle of the table a mortar filled with a golden sauce. Everyone digs in with a spoon right away. \n\n\n\nThe raw garlic bites first, then the olive oil rounds everything out, with just enough lemon to keep it all fresh. After that, the jar of mayonnaise in the cupboard tastes pretty bland.\n\n\n\nStill-hot air fryer baby potatoes, for dipping in the mortar\n\n\n\nWhat Is Aioli?\n\n\n\nAioli is a raw sauce from Provence: garlic pounded to a paste with salt, two egg yolks, then extra virgin olive oil worked in little by little with the pestle, plus a little lemon juice. The emulsion works the same way as a mayonnaise, except that classic mayonnaise is made with neutral oil and no garlic, whereas aioli is made only with olive oil, on a garlic base. The sauce is thicker and more fragrant than Japanese mayonnaise or sriracha mayonnaise. The pairing of garlic and citrus also shows up in French Caribbean sauce chien, which is much runnier.\n\n\n\nThe word comes from the Occitan alh, garlic, and \u00f2li, oil: the name already tells you the recipe. In Provence, people distinguish aioli, the sauce, from grand aioli, the complete meal it goes with.\n\n\n\nNo time to pound? There\u2019s always our quick garlic sauce with mayonnaise\n\n\n\nOn Fridays, Aioli in the Middle of the Table\n\n\n\nIn Proven\u00e7al families, aioli was the dish for meatless days, especially Fridays, served with fish and vegetables. Its thick texture and golden color earned it the nickname \u201cthe butter of Provence,\u201d in a region where olive oil takes the place of butter. In 1891, the poet Fr\u00e9d\u00e9ric Mistral even named the newspaper he founded to defend the Proven\u00e7al language L\u2019Ai\u00f2li.\n\n\n\nGrand aioli brings together desalted, poached salt cod, steamed vegetables (potatoes, carrots, cauliflower, green beans) and hard-boiled eggs around the mortar. The fish and vegetables come to the table warm, while the sauce stays at room temperature. Several Proven\u00e7al villages still hold aioli festivals, with outdoor meals at long shared tables.\n\n\n\nIn Spain, a little garlic and olive oil also go with patatas bravas\n\n\n\nOn the other side of the Pyrenees, Catalan allioli is made without egg, with just garlic, salt and olive oil. It\u2019s worked drop by drop for many long minutes and breaks easily. The Proven\u00e7al version adds egg yolks, which stabilize the emulsion and let you work in more oil.\n\n\n\nThe Main Ingredients in Aioli\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nIt all starts with garlic: four cloves for four people, three for a milder flavor, five for a punchy sauce. Each clove is cut in half and the germ removed, since the green sprout adds bitterness. A pinch of fine salt helps the pestle grind the garlic into a smooth paste. Raw garlic keeps all its bite, a far cry from the toasty notes of fried garlic.\n\n\n\nThe two egg yolks provide the lecithin that binds the oil to the rest of the sauce. They should be at room temperature, like the oil and garlic: a temperature difference between the ingredients is the number one reason a sauce breaks.\n\n\n\nExtra virgin olive oil is what gives aioli its flavor. Choose a mild, fruity one, because a very pungent oil with green, grassy notes makes the sauce bitter. Fresh lemon juice, added halfway through, balances the richness of the oil. Mustard and vinegar are best left to mayonnaise.\n\n\n\nTechnique Tips for a Good Aioli\n\n\n\nAt first the oil goes in drop by drop, with the pestle turning nonstop, until the base thickens and turns opaque. Only then does it go in as a thin stream, for about 8 minutes of emulsifying in all. If the sauce breaks, start again with a room-temperature egg yolk in a clean bowl and work the broken sauce into it in a very slow stream, as if it were oil. Without a mortar, a whisk or a blender will do the job, following the same order.\n\n\n\nWhat Do You Serve with Aioli?\n\n\n\nAioli is served at room temperature, never heated: heat breaks the emulsion. Beyond grand aioli, it goes with an air fryer fish fillet, accras de morue or air fryer breaded fish. A spoonful can also stand in for mayonnaise in eggs mimosa, for a more garlicky version.\n\n\n\nBaked white fish with pan-fried zucchini, with aioli on the side\n\n\n\nFor vegetables, still-warm air fryer zucchini or air fryer eggplant work really well. Aioli keeps for 24 hours at most in the refrigerator, in a bowl covered with plastic wrap, and can\u2019t be frozen. It\u2019s best made the same day, no more than 3 to 4 hours ahead, and taken out of the refrigerator 20 minutes before serving.\n\n\n\n\n\n\tAuthentic Aioli Recipe\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\n\t\tGarlic Base4 cloves garlic, (or 3 for a milder flavor, 5 for a stronger one)1 pinch fine salt2 egg yolks, (at room temperature)Emulsifying with Olive Oil200 ml extra-virgin olive oil, (mild and only slightly bitter)1 tablespoon lemon juice (fresh)\t\n\t\n\t\tGarlic BaseTake the olive oil, eggs and garlic out of the refrigerator at least 30 minutes before you start: a temperature difference between the ingredients is the number one reason a sauce splits.Peel the garlic cloves.Cut each clove in half and remove the central germ: it makes the sauce bitter.Put the garlic and salt in the mortar.Pound with the pestle until you have a smooth, even paste with no visible pieces.Add the egg yolks.Mix vigorously with the pestle for 2 minutes, until you have a smooth, golden base.Emulsifying with Olive OilStart by adding the olive oil drop by drop, turning the pestle without ever stopping, until the mixture thickens and turns opaque.Continue in a thin, steady stream, still stirring constantly: the emulsion gradually forms, and the sauce thickens and takes on a lovely golden color.When you are halfway through the oil, add the lemon juice to balance the sauce.Work in the rest of the oil in a thin stream, still stirring, for a total emulsifying time of about 8 minutes.Taste and adjust the salt.Serve at room temperature, never heated: heat breaks the emulsion.Variation Without a MortarPut the garlic (peeled, germ removed and crushed), the egg yolks and the salt in a mixing bowl.Whisk, or blend at medium speed, until the mixture is smooth.Add the oil exactly as you would in the mortar, drop by drop and then in a thin stream, whisking constantly.Add the lemon juice halfway through, work in the rest of the oil, then adjust the salt.\t\n\t\n\t\tIn Provence, people distinguish between aioli, the sauce, and grand aioli, the full dish. The word comes from the Occitan alh (garlic) and oli (oil). For grand aioli, the sauce is served with soaked and poached salt cod, steamed vegetables (potatoes, carrots, cauliflower, green beans) and hard-boiled eggs. The vegetables and cod come to the table warm, while the sauce stays at room temperature.\nIf the sauce splits even though the ingredients were at room temperature, start a new emulsion with a room-temperature egg yolk in a clean bowl, then work in the split sauce in a very slow stream, as if it were oil. The sauce will come back together almost without fail.\nBitterness most often comes from the olive oil: choose a mild, fruity oil made from olives harvested ripe, and avoid very \u201cgrassy\u201d oils. The other cause is garlic that is too young or whose germ has not been fully removed. A few drops of lemon juice at the end of emulsifying also help balance any lingering bitterness.\nAioli is not garlic mayonnaise: mayonnaise is made with a neutral oil (sunflower, canola) and no garlic, while aioli is made only with extra-virgin olive oil, with the garlic pounded into a paste before the oil goes in. The result is more fragrant and denser.\nQuick version, without a mortar: blend the garlic and egg yolks with an immersion blender, then emulsify the sauce with an electric hand mixer. The result is creamy and very close to the original.\nStorage: in the refrigerator, in a bowl covered with plastic wrap, for 24 hours at most. Beyond that, the garlic oxidizes and the sauce develops an unpleasant bitterness. Never freeze it, as the emulsion does not survive thawing. Ideally, make it the same day, no more than 3 to 4 hours ahead, and take it out of the refrigerator 20 minutes before serving.\n\t\n\t\n\t\tSauceFran\u00e7aise","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206417"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206417\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/205875"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marcwiner.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}