Chefs opt to make their own mayonnaise, mustard, ketchup

Condiments can be a very personal thing. People raised on a particular mayonnaise, mustard or ketchup have emotional attachments to it and don’t like it to be messed with.

But chefs are creating their own condiments anyway, often with positive results.

Fresh To Order, an Atlanta-based fast-casual chain with 11 units in Georgia, Florida and Tennessee, makes its own mayonnaise that it uses as a base for several other sauces, chief operations officer Jesse Gideon said.

“We do it because none of the mayonnaises out there taste the way we want them to taste,” he said.

“We make our mayonnaise more like what a lot of people would associate with a traditional aïoli,” he said, with olive oil, lots of garlic, less salt than most mayonnaises, more pepper and a little more lemon.

From there, Fresh To Order makes horseradish mayonnaise, tarragon mayonnaise, chile-avocado mayonnaise and other variations for different sandwiches and salads.

For a ciabatta sandwich with roasted pork and butternut squash, they add whole grain mustard to the mayonnaise. For a black bean burger, they mix the mayonnaise base with horseradish, fresh herbs and proprietary seasonings.

Part of the appeal is that the condiments are still recognizable as mayonnaise, but better.

“It’s such a big part of what we do,” Gideon said. “We sell a lot of sandwiches, and because we take that mayonnaise as a mother base and convert that into other sauces and spreads we use a lot of it. It’s definitely a secret to our success.”

Mustard is where chef James Rigato of The Root Restaurant & Bar in White Lake, Mich., gets creative. He said customers want mainstream ketchup and mayonnaise, but they give him free reign with mustard.

“I have at least five different mustards in the cooler,” Rigato said

He takes two approaches to his mustard: a simple purée of mustard seeds or mustard powder with vinegar and other flavorings, and a béarnaise-style preparation in which he emulsifies slowly poaching egg as the base.

The coffee-cherry mustard he serves with smoked pulled pork, pickled onions and creamy local white Cheddar grits is a version of the simple mustard. Evoking the bounty of Michigan summer, he purées brewed coffee and espresso from a local roaster, local beet sugar, Michigan dried cherries, apple cider vinegar and yellow and brown mustard seeds.

“It’s easy but it’s delicious,” Rigato said. “The way the brown mustard seeds kind of snuggle with the coffee, and the sweetness of the cherries and acid of the vinegar — it kind of takes on a barbecue flavor. It’s great on a charcuterie board, too.”

He uses the béarnaise-style mustard for his plum, green chile and tart cherry mustards. To make them, he mixes dry mustard powder with vinegar, sugar and spices, along with the plum, green chile or tart cherry, and mixes that with egg that he slowly cooks over a double boiler to 160 degrees Fahrenheit.

The green chile mustard appears in a popular sandwich with local bologna, lettuce and tomato.

Although Rigato mostly uses mainstream ketchup, he also makes his own chipotle ketchup for Wall Street Fries, which are served with three different condiments.

“It’s definitely been done before,” he acknowledged, but that’s the point.

“It’s an ’80s throwback dish,” he said, because he thinks of the ’80s as a decade dominated by Wall Street.

To make the chipotle ketchup, he sweats onions with chipotle and jalapeño peppers, then adds sugar, vinegar and San Marzano tomatoes. He simmers the mixture for about half an hour, then purées it.

“It loves Americana,” he said of the ketchup. “If you were going to do a meat loaf, it would be great with this.”

He also serves the fries with truffle aïoli and a classic spicy Chinese mustard made by reconstituting the powder.
 

Gauging customer reactions

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Chefs who veer away from the norm with condiments, especially ketchup, might want to check customers’ reactions first.

Chef Michael DeFonzo of New York’s four-unit casual-dining chain P.J. Clarke’s and three-unit fast-casual burger chain Clarke’s Standard started introducing a locally made premium ketchup about three years ago.

“I really wanted a better product,” DeFonzo said. “The food business is funny. There’s a lot of people who say they have a farm-to-table restaurant but they still put [mainstream] ketchup on the table. I want the condiment to fit the best food that we’re serving.”

But did customers?

To find out, he started offering the new ketchup in ramekins. Servers and managers asked diners what they thought about it. After getting mostly positive responses, the restaurant started serving them both at the table, side by side.

“People would pick up [the local ketchup] and look at it and say, ‘Oh, what is that?’ and our servers could engage with anyone who had a question,” he said.

DeFonzo and his team set out comment cards asking customers what they liked and didn’t like about each ketchup. The majority preferred the local brand, so it stayed on tables.

However, he also left the mainstream brand on the counter so customers could see that it was still available if they asked for it.

“It’s all about making the guest feel comfortable,” DeFonzo said. “They don’t want to feel like they’re force-fed something.”

He has found other uses for it, too.

“A few of the bartenders were playing with it in their Bloody Marys. I also made a barbecue sauce with it,” he said.

Although the local ketchup is more expensive and customers are using more of it, DeFonzo said the cost, “is a blip on the map. Has it significantly affected my food cost? No. I’m more concerned about the price of lettuce than ketchup.”
 

Cost factor

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Price is a concern for some chefs.

Chef–owner Greg Atkinson of Restaurant Marché in Bainbridge Island, Wash., makes all condiments in house using premium, mostly organic ingredients, including aïoli and ketchup for hundreds of pounds of French fries served each week, red onion jam for chicken liver pâté and fig preserves for foie gras torchon.

Making the condiments is not cheap.

“Sometimes I’m just afraid to look at the numbers, especially when so much of it gets thrown away,” Atkinson said. “But to me it just wouldn’t be any fun to serve anything less. That’s why I run my own restaurant, to make my own food. I’m a small proprietor of a café and it makes sense for us.”

To make ketchup, he infuses red wine vinegar with a proprietary pickling spice blend, strains it and adds organic sugar, kosher salt and tomato paste. He bottles the mixture and puts it in a combi oven set at 212 degrees Fahrenheit and 100-percent moisture.

“It creates the effect of a boiling water bath,” Atkinson said. “It’s not too difficult and it really is kind of a fun craft for us. I can have a dishwasher or an idle prep cook slice red onions for the red onion jam, and we kind of weave [the prep] through the day.”

However, keeping up with the amount of aïoli needed is challenging. The condiment is included with every order of fries, which are served with one of the restaurant’s most popular dishes, moules frites, which come with an ounce and a half of aïoli.

The aioli is made with local eggs, garlic and Champagne vinegar emulsified it with a blend of canola and extra virgin olive oils.

The onion jam is made with julienned red onions simmered in a syrup of equal parts red wine vinegar and organic sugar until nearly fully reduced.

Some larger chains are also making their own condiments, too, including 143-unit Hard Rock Café.

“At Hard Rock, we work hard every day to bring fresh, American, scratch-based cuisine to guests around the world,” Hard Rock International executive chef Russell Booth said, noting that it’s part of the chain’s commitment to fresh ingredients and scratch-made offerings.

“Our housemade condiments are no different,” he said.

Although mainstream condiments are also available, Booth’s team makes two specialty ketchups — Thai and honey chipotle — as well as roasted garlic aïoli and Sriracha mayonnaise.

Contact Bret Thorn at [email protected]
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