Aioli, allioli or aïoli ( or ;
Provençal oc, alhòli or ''aiòli'' ; ca, allioli ; es, alioli ) is a cold
sauce
In cooking, a sauce is a liquid, cream, or semi-solid food, served on or used in preparing other foods. Most sauces are not normally consumed by themselves; they add flavor, moisture, and visual appeal to a dish. ''Sauce'' is a French wor ...
consisting of an emulsion of garlic and olive oil; it is found in the cuisines of the northwest
Mediterranean
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on ...
, from
Andalusia
Andalusia (, ; es, Andalucía ) is the southernmost autonomous community in Peninsular Spain. It is the most populous and the second-largest autonomous community in the country. It is officially recognised as a "historical nationality". The ...
to
Calabria
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, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 =
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographics1_title1 =
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, demographics1_title2 ...
.
The names mean "
garlic
Garlic (''Allium sativum'') is a species of bulbous flowering plant in the genus '' Allium''. Its close relatives include the onion, shallot, leek, chive, Welsh onion and Chinese onion. It is native to South Asia, Central Asia and northeas ...
and oil" in Catalan and Provençal. It is found in the cuisines of the Mediterranean coasts of Spain (
Catalonia
Catalonia (; ca, Catalunya ; Aranese Occitan: ''Catalonha'' ; es, Cataluña ) is an autonomous community of Spain, designated as a '' nationality'' by its Statute of Autonomy.
Most of the territory (except the Val d'Aran) lies on the no ...
, the Valencian Community, the Balearic Islands, Murcia, and eastern Andalusia), France (Provence), Italy (Sicily and Calabria), and Malta.
Some versions of the sauce are closer to a garlic mayonnaise, incorporating
egg yolks
Among animals which produce eggs, the yolk (; also known as the vitellus) is the nutrient-bearing portion of the egg whose primary function is to supply food for the development of the embryo. Some types of egg contain no yolk, for example be ...
and
lemon juice
The lemon (''Citrus limon'') is a species of small evergreen trees in the flowering plant family Rutaceae, native to Asia, primarily Northeast India (Assam), Northern Myanmar or China.
The tree's ellipsoidal yellow fruit is used for culina ...
, whereas other versions lack egg yolk and contain more garlic. This gives the sauce a pastier texture, making it more laborious as the emulsion is harder to stabilize.
[J.-B. Reboul, ''La Cuisinière Provençale'' 1910 (1st edition); 1989 (25th edition), p. 88][ Robert Courtine, ''The Hundred Glories of French Cooking'' (tr. Derek Coldman), 1973, p. 140][Henri Philippon, ''Cuisine de Provence'', 1977 (2nd ed), p. 20][Mireille Johnston, ''The Cuisine of the Sun'', 1976; Johnston gives one recipe without extra flavorings (p. 75) and one with mustard (p. 229)] There are many variations, such as adding lemon juice or other seasonings. In
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
, it may include mustard.
Prosper Montagné
Prosper Montagné (; 14 November 1865 – 22 April 1948) was one of the most renowned French chefs of the Belle Époque and author of many books and articles on food, cooking, and gastronomy, notably Larousse Gastronomique (1938), an encyclopedic ...
, ''Larousse Gastronomique
' () is an encyclopedia of gastronomy. The majority of the book is about French cuisine, and contains recipes for French dishes and cooking techniques. The first edition included few non-French dishes and ingredients; later editions include many ...
'' (1938, tr. 1961), ''s.v.''
Like
mayonnaise
Mayonnaise (; ), colloquially referred to as "mayo" , is a thick, cold, and creamy sauce or dressing commonly used on sandwiches, hamburgers, composed salads, and French fries. It also forms the base for various other sauces, such as tarta ...
, aioli is an
emulsion
An emulsion is a mixture of two or more liquids that are normally immiscible (unmixable or unblendable) owing to liquid-liquid phase separation. Emulsions are part of a more general class of two-phase systems of matter called colloids. Alth ...
or suspension of small globules of oil and oil-soluble compounds in water and water-soluble compounds. In Spain, purists believe aioli should not include egg, but in France and elsewhere, egg or egg yolk is the usual emulsifier.
Since about 1990, it has become common in the United States to call all flavored
mayonnaise
Mayonnaise (; ), colloquially referred to as "mayo" , is a thick, cold, and creamy sauce or dressing commonly used on sandwiches, hamburgers, composed salads, and French fries. It also forms the base for various other sauces, such as tarta ...
s ''aioli''. Purists insist that flavored mayonnaise can contain garlic, but true aioli contains garlic and no other seasoning (except salt).
Etymology
The word is a transparent compound of the words meaning "garlic" and "oil."
The
English
English usually refers to:
* English language
* English people
English may also refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England
** English national ...
spelling comes from the French ''aïoli'', which itself comes from
Occitan. The spelling in Occitan may be ''alhòli'', following the classical norm, or ''aiòli'', following the
Mistralian norm. In
Catalan
Catalan may refer to:
Catalonia
From, or related to Catalonia:
* Catalan language, a Romance language
* Catalans, an ethnic group formed by the people from, or with origins in, Northern or southern Catalonia
Places
* 13178 Catalan, asteroid #1 ...
it is spelled ''allioli'' (). The most common term in
Spanish
Spanish might refer to:
* Items from or related to Spain:
**Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain
**Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries
**Spanish cuisine
Other places
* Spanish, Ontario, Can ...
is ''alioli'', an adaptation from Catalan, although it is also called ''ajoaceite'', ''ajiaceite'', ''ajolio'' or ''ajaceite''. It is also spelt ''alioli'' in
Galician.
Basic recipe
Garlic is crushed in a
mortar and pestle
Mortar and pestle is a set of two simple tools used from the Stone Age to the present day to prepare ingredients or substances by crushing and grinding them into a fine paste or powder in the kitchen, laboratory, and pharmacy. The ''mortar'' ( ...
and emulsified with salt and olive oil. Today, aioli is often made in a
food processor
A food processor is a kitchen appliance used to facilitate repetitive tasks in the preparation of food. Today, the term almost always refers to an electric-motor-driven appliance, although there are some manual devices also referred to as "food ...
or
blender
A blender (sometimes called a mixer or liquidiser in British English) is a kitchen and laboratory appliance used to mix, crush, purée or emulsify food and other substances. A stationary blender consists of a blender container with a rotating me ...
, but some traditionalists object that this does not give the same result.
Serving
In
Malta
Malta ( , , ), officially the Republic of Malta ( mt, Repubblika ta' Malta ), is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea. It consists of an archipelago, between Italy and Libya, and is often considered a part of Southern Europe. It lies ...
,
arjoli or ajjoli is commonly made with the addition of either crushed galletti (a type of cracker) or tomato.
In
Occitan cuisine, ''aioli'' is typically served with
seafood
Seafood is any form of sea life regarded as food by humans, prominently including fish and shellfish. Shellfish include various species of molluscs (e.g. bivalve molluscs such as clams, oysters and mussels, and cephalopods such as octopus an ...
, fish
soup
Soup is a primarily liquid food, generally served warm or hot (but may be cool or cold), that is made by combining ingredients of meat or vegetables with stock, milk, or water. Hot soups are additionally characterized by boiling soli ...
, and
croutons
A crouton is a piece of rebaked bread, often cubed and seasoned. Croutons are used to add texture and flavor to salads—notably the Caesar salad— or eaten as a snack food.
Etymology
The word crouton is derived from the French ''croûton' ...
. An example is a dish called ''merluça amb alhòli''.
In the
Occitan Valleys
The Occitan Valleys ( oc, Valadas Occitanas; it, Valli Occitane; pms, Valade Ossitan-e; french: Vallées Occitanes; frp, Valâdes Occitanes) are the part of Occitania (the territory of the Occitan language) within the borders of Italy.
It is a ...
of Italy it is served with potatoes boiled with salt and
bay laurel
''Laurus nobilis'' is an aromatic evergreen tree or large shrub with green, glabrous (smooth) leaves. It is in the flowering plant family Lauraceae. It is native to the Mediterranean region and is used as bay leaf for seasoning in cookin ...
.
In
Provençal cuisine, ''aioli'' or, more formally, ''le grand aïoli'', ''aioli garni'', or ''aïoli monstre'' is a
dish consisting of various boiled vegetables (usually
carrot
The carrot ('' Daucus carota'' subsp. ''sativus'') is a root vegetable, typically orange in color, though purple, black, red, white, and yellow cultivars exist, all of which are domesticated forms of the wild carrot, ''Daucus carota'', na ...
s,
potato
The potato is a starchy food, a tuber of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'' and is a root vegetable native to the Americas. The plant is a perennial in the nightshade family Solanaceae.
Wild potato species can be found from the southern Uni ...
es,
artichoke
The globe artichoke (''Cynara cardunculus'' var. ''scolymus'' ),Rottenberg, A., and D. Zohary, 1996: "The wild ancestry of the cultivated artichoke." Genet. Res. Crop Evol. 43, 53–58. also known by the names French artichoke and green articho ...
s, and
green bean
Green beans are young, unripe fruits of various cultivars of the common bean ('' Phaseolus vulgaris''), although immature or young pods of the runner bean ('' Phaseolus coccineus''), yardlong bean ( ''Vigna unguiculata'' subsp. ''sesquipedali ...
s), poached fish (normally soaked
salt cod),
snails, canned tuna, other seafood, and boiled eggs, all served with ''aioli''. This dish is often served during the festivities on the
feast day
The calendar of saints is the traditional Christian method of organizing a liturgical year by associating each day with one or more saints and referring to the day as the feast day or feast of said saint. The word "feast" in this context do ...
s of the patron saint of Provençal villages and towns. It is traditional to serve it with snails for
Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve is the evening or entire day before Christmas Day, the festival commemorating the birth of Jesus. Christmas Day is observed around the world, and Christmas Eve is widely observed as a full or partial holiday in anticipation ...
and with cod on
Ash Wednesday
Ash Wednesday is a holy day of prayer and fasting in many Western Christian denominations. It is preceded by Shrove Tuesday and falls on the first day of Lent (the six weeks of penitence before Easter). It is observed by Catholics in the ...
.
Aïoli is so strongly associated with Provence that when the poet
Frédéric Mistral
Joseph Étienne Frédéric Mistral (; oc, Josèp Estève Frederic Mistral, 8 September 1830 – 25 March 1914) was a French writer of Occitan literature and lexicographer of the Provençal form of the language. He received the 1904 Nobel P ...
started a regionalist Provençal-language newspaper in 1891, he called it ''
L'Aiòli''.
The Provençal cuisine fish soup
bourride is generally served with ''aioli''.
[ Waverly Root, ''The Food of France'', 1958-1992, ]
p. 359
/ref>
In Spain, particularly in Catalan cuisine
Catalan cuisine is the cuisine from Catalonia. It may also refer to the shared cuisine of Northern Catalonia and Andorra, the second of which has a similar cuisine to that of the neighbouring Alt Urgell and Cerdanya '' comarques'' and which ...
and Valencian cuisine
250px, '' Oranges, typical fruit from Valencian Community''
Valencian cuisine is a Mediterranean cuisine as cooked in the Valencian Community, Spain. Its basic ingredients are vegetables, seafood and meat. It is famous worldwide for its rices, su ...
, ''allioli'' is often served with arròs negre
''Arròs negre'' (, es, arroz negro) is a Valencian and Catalan dish made with cuttlefish (or squid) and rice, somewhat similar to seafood paella. Some call it ''paella negra'' (''"black paella"''), although it is traditionally not called a pa ...
, arròs a banda
Arròs a banda ( Valencian term for ''rice on the side'', translated as ''Arroz a banda'' in Spanish) is a dish of rice cooked in fish stock, typical of the coastal area of Alicante (and, per extension, in most of the Valencian Community), Spai ...
, fideuà
Fideuà (dialectal pronunciation of the Valencian word ''fideuada'' "large amount of noodles" from Hisp. Ar. ''fidáwš'') is a seafood dish originally from the coast of Valencia that is similar to paella, and even more so to arròs a banda, bu ...
, with grilled snails (''cargols a la llauna''), lamb, rabbit, vegetables, boiled cod (''bacallà a la catalana, bacallà amb patates'') and comes in other varieties such as ''allioli de codony'' (allioli with boiled quince, not the preserve) or allioli with boiled pear
Pears are fruits produced and consumed around the world, growing on a tree and harvested in the Northern Hemisphere in late summer into October. The pear tree and shrub are a species of genus ''Pyrus'' , in the Family (biology), family Rosacea ...
. Other commonly used vegetables are beets, fennel, celery, zucchini, cauliflower, chickpeas, and raw tomato.
See also
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
References
{{Condiments
Catalan cuisine
Cuisine of Provence
French cuisine
Garlic dishes
Italian cuisine
Macedonian cuisine
Maltese cuisine
Mayonnaise
Spanish cuisine
Tapas