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Hi GDonna!

I was so happy when I started making my families mayonnaise. I use a stick blender too. My recipe is similar but I use regular mustard. I will have to try Dijon next time I have it on hand. We use mayonnaise for tuna salad and egg salad mostly. As a family of five I can usually use it all up on whichever meal we are using for. We don’t tend to use it for sandwiches, because it’s not made up. I will drizzle olive oil on sandwiches.

I’ve also always wanted to try a birch stick whisk! 

Your mayonnaise looks luscious!  I looked in my copy of the Settlement Cookbook, first published in 1901,  and their ingredient list for mayonnaise (one of several, some cooked, and one even using hard cooked egg yolks as an ingredient) is just about the same as yours other than a teaspoon of sugar and "a speck" of cayenne.  The cookbook was a present from my mother-in-law in 1969----good thinking on her part-----when I married her son I only knew how to make about four things, just barely enough to keep body and soul together.  The cookbook was put together by a group of women in Milwaukee, Wisconsin who volunteered at a settlement house for newly arrived  immigrants "to help them learn about American life and American ways".  Mrs. Kandor, one of the volunteers, thought up a more efficient way to offer recipes rather than printing them out on a chalkboard and having the "students" copy them out by hand.   The women came up with a plan for a cookbook and asked the Settlement board (all men of course) for $18.00 to  cover the printing.  The board turned them down and suggested that the ladies "have the work done on their own and offered to share in any profits from your little venture". By 1903 after a second printing of the cookbook the "ladies" gave the board enough money from their "venture" to purchase a site for a new and larger Settlement House.  In 1909 they are able to prove the money for the building for the Settlement House from the proceeds of the sale of the cookbook!  That must has been sweet revenge and did some good as well.  The final edition, 43rd, was printed in 1991.
  

I'm not a fan of mayo but it is interesting.  Love your whisks!  Also, what I liked best about this article is that I now know you must be feeling somewhat better.  You know how I know?  You are moving things around again :-)  Looking forward to seeing what you do with spelt.  I love the more wholesome flavor and have used it quite a bit myself.

Glad you are well.

Hi Grandma Donna,

Your stick blender mayonnaise looked so luxurious and yummy. Store-bought mayo never has that gorgeous yellow color.

I have finally decided to get serious about bread baking because I am so annoyed by how much it costs in the stores these days! I make my own pizza dough but the cost of the raisin bread I love is almost $6 now and it’s not even a fancy, organic brand or anything - it’s getting ridiculous. Like you, I am increasingly wanting to pare down and simplify. I look forward to your new bread recipe.

Also, I wanted to ask, where do you find your old newspaper recipe photos? I had been thinking of searching on the Digital Public Library of America’s website for some vintage recipes and when I saw yours in this post, I figured you’d have better advice for where to look. 

I will always admire how you and Charles make even simple moments (like making mayo) so fun and loving.

All my best,

Diamond

So good to hear from you today!  I am curious about the eggs you use for the mayonnaise.  Were they store bought or fresh eggs?  I would love to know because I do not have local egg source and if I tried this recipe it would be with store bought eggs.  I will bet you two looked romantic making the mayonnaise all wrapped up and intertwined like that!  ; )

I’ve seen those whisks on Early American on YouTube.  They look so functional.  You’ll have to share if they are easy to clean and dry. 
Now maybe I should go make my own mayo.  You are inspiring

I have questions! :)

#1 Do you think this is a mayonnaise maker? (See attached photos) My family has had it "forever" but I don't remember mayonnaise ever being made in it.  I remember my mom using it for eggnog or something a few times before we got electricity.  But from your description I thought hmm, maybe that's what those beaters in the jar are really for!

#2 Did you find any instructions for using one?  I'm wondering whether I would need to keep lifting the lid to add the oil a little at a time (which would also lift the beaters, which might be bad?). Or would I just put all the ingredients in at the start?

#3 Does anyone know if I can use corn oil?  I like the flavor better than olive oil, and it's so much cheaper, but I don't know whether the mayonnaise would thicken properly if I start changing things.

Any feedback would be much appreciated!

I was excited to read your mayonnaise post as I have been considering making my own mayonnaise for awhile now and was getting ready to take the plunge.  My main concern is whether I will be able to use it all up before it goes bad as we are a small household. 

GRANDMA DONNA WROTE,  Diamond A,  you can go to a local library that has a research room with microfilms and search there in the newspapers.  Also there is Newspapers online that you can research through.  I do both.  

Christina A, I use store bought eggs. I normally use store bought brown eggs.

Tea S, It is possible that would work but they mostly have a blade or a round disk with holes in the bottom.  I will do some research on that one but I think that it is for whipping.

Julie V,  It makes only a small amount at a time.  It has been working out for Charles and I here.  We make it when we know we will be using mayonnaise and menu plan for things we can put it in. 

Victoria W, Thank you for the information. 

Thank you all up above for the comments.   I want to put here a link to the article where I posted how to make Queens cakes.  Over on instagram there were some question asking what it is. I put the recipe in a post and not in the cooking from scratch section.  I need to add that recipe in there.  So if you are interested in the Queens Cakes it is a very old recipe, the ones I studied were from 1820 to 1830 plus after I found a recipe for Funeral Cookies which I made and also posted about.  The one I have I chose because it is so simple and I just make it with a wood spoon and  large bowl.  This is the link to that recipe. https://gdonna.com/living-like-the-past/contentmen...

If you cannot pull this up, and you are using a computer to read my blog there is a search area on the right of the main menu page and you can type in the word contentment and that article is in there.

The recipe is further down but it is in that article.  Grandma Donna

I'm always late in the game on reading your posts but I always read them. It's like visiting with an old friend! I've tried to make mayonnaise in the past and it was not good. But I tried following your recipe today and I made a mayonnaise my family will eat. I might have done a happy dance! My husband lives on mayonnaise so this is wonderful. And one more way to use an egg from our chickens! And eat a little healthier too!

GRANDMA DONNA WROTE, Rhonda M, I am so happy that you made this mayonnaise.  Happy dances are good and so happy that your family will like this.  Just remember it does not keep as long as a jar of store bought.

I have wanted to make our own mayonnaise for such a long time. I read recently somewhere that if you want the mayonnaise to last longer you can add something fermented to it. If I remember correctly it would be like part of a sauerkraut juice. I can't remember exactly, but I'm sure it's on the internet somewhere. I think most of the time folks are used to things lasting a long time especially since refrigeration is such a convenience. I try and make things such as that if at all possible in case the power goes out which it does all the time. Townsends is great show and everytime we watch it we seem to learn something new. I'm very curiouse how the stick beaters wash up. We saw those types at just about every historical site we have ever visited. I did have a question regarding this photo. I have never heard of salt brining veggies like this before. If you could I would be interested in the rest of the article. My guess is they were doing a bit of fermenting. 

Grandma Donna Wrote, Andrea the rest of the salting article.

Thank you! I'm going to save this.

GRANDMA DONNA WROTE, Andrea B, one more things about the article, it was written in the year 1919. 

Good to know-I will add that to my notes on it. I recently learned about the sulfur with fermenting. I saw a video on how they do it. I don't think I would use that method and I will just stick to my regular fermenting, but it's another piece of knowledge to have. Recently I had wondered how they stored so many vegetables and assumed it was in crocks, but I didn't have a good picture of things and hadn't had a chance to research it more. The crocks make perfect sense and could hold so much in them. I did read though that if you were soaking vegetables, meat or fish that it would be best to change the water out at least once while doing so.