MONITOR:The question of balance is crucial to making the most of aioli, writes HUGO ARNOLD
BUGBEAR OF THE MOMENT is that most summer of sauces, aioli. It is everywhere, partnered with seafood, used in place of mayonnaise and seldom anything like what it should be.
The emphasis of recent revolutionary culinary trends is on how to make eating lighter. Cooking to temperature, whether sous vide or in direct contact with the heat source, has resulted in the flavour of ingredients playing a far more defined role, leaving chefs with a rich and varied canvas. So why, with all these advances, does the idea of aioli become immersed in mayonnaise?
Too many chefs seem to think a bit of crushed garlic is what this sauce is about. Binding oil with crushed garlic is not easy. It requires both skill and patience and an understanding of what the sauce is about. Essentially, it is the contrast of delicacy with power, a light summer sauce but with attitude.
We are not the farmers and manual workers we once were and the sheer power of garlic sits uncomfortably with many modern lifestyles. In recent years I have enjoyed aioli made with garlic blanched several times in milk. I have had it made with mild and creamy new-season garlic and with garlic that has been roasted in its skin, the flesh becoming milky white, smooth and silky. In all cases, however, the sauce has been just that, garlic and oil.
The use of egg yolks, while ubiquitous, is not so much wrong as ill-considered. The binding of oil to garlic remains the essence of the sauce, additional ingredients should and can play a supporting role, but they are there to achieve a definite aim. And why stop at eggs? Water, stock, vinegar and lemon juice have all been used, as well as bread, potatoes and other vegetables or fruit, like pear and quince, which can help in the emulsification process.
Tempering garlic’s strength is all-important but that is not done by drowning it in a sea of mayonnaise. There is no need to be revolutionary about it, just balanced in the approach. For a modern, mild aioli, roast three or four cloves of garlic in a preheated oven (180C/gas mark 4) for 20 minutes without peeling. When cool enough to handle, peel and mash with a little salt in a pestle and mortar. Whisk in 200ml of olive oil very slowly at first and then in a steady stream as you would for mayonnaise.
Aioli is essentially an emulsified vinaigrette. It can be blunt, or elegant. It can drown or enhance. But garlicy mayonnaise it certainly is not.