At our french conversation class last week, as usual, we played a word game for the last little while and the game we played was all about language, french language of course! it was all about meanings, derivations, obscure vocabulary and other wordy questions. One of the words which came up was ‘mayonnaise’ and where the word came from, who invented it, how did it come about and there were three answers to choose from… and we all got it correct, we ll knew the right answer!
It seemed one of those odd coincidences as just that morning I had written about what I had made for lunch which included mayonnaise, and I had actually done a little research about it. it is generally agreed that the birth of mayonnaise came in 1756 when the Duc de Richelieu’s chef made it up in the place of cream which had run out in the kitchen. The chef improvised using eggs and olive oil and it was a terrific success, so much so that it was named after the Duc’s victory in battle against the British at Port Mahon, Mahonnaise.
The most popular mayonnaise in Britain today is Hellmann’s; Hellmann wasn’t a chef but a German lady, the wife of Richard Hellmann an immigrant to new York who had a deli. He used Frau Hellmann’s recipes for his mayonnaise, and the one sold in jars with a blue ribbon were the most popular, and that is why there is a blue ribbon on the label even to this day!
Hellmann’s, now no longer owned by the Hellmann family, have a wider range of sauces and salad dressings now and I would guess most families have a jar in their cupboards – apart from those who prefer salad cream! I have never tried to make my own mayonnaise… maybe I should!
Lois Elsden 