I love mayonnaise. But with my being on a cross between Jini Patel Thompson’s diet and a low residue diet following my surgery, Hellman’s, with its additives and fillers, is simply out.

So it occurred to me this evening that it must be really easy to make my own – and I was totally right. My Ayurvedic consultant has recommended lots of warm, sweet, cosy foods, and lots of Ghee, to help keep my Vata Dosha under control – I’ll write about this soon in a different post – so I was delighted to find a recipe for Ghee Mayo on Mark Sisson’s excellent Paleo site. The Mayo will certainly help add the cosy comfort factor to my food.

Here’s Mark’s recipe:

• 2 egg yolks
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
• 1/4 teaspoon mustard (or dried mustard powder)
• 1/4 teaspoon sea salt
• 3/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
• Approximately 5 tablespoons of ghee, at room temperature

I changed the recipe a little to suit my taste: I used Organic Rapeseed Oil, as I find Olive oil too strong a taste for Mayo. I also used half a teaspoon of Mustard instead of a quarter, and a little more than a tablespoon of Lemon Juice.

I also found a single tablespoon of Ghee to be plenty, and quite overpowering, taste-wise; I think I actually preferred the Mayo before I added the Ghee, but I’ve got to keep the Vata in mind!

Here are Mark’s instructions:

In a food processor, blend the yolks, lemon juice, mustard and salt for a few seconds until combined. With the food processor running, gradually add oil in a slow steady stream until the mixture begins to thicken, at least 30 seconds.

When the mixture has thickened into mayonnaise, scrape it out of the food processor into a bowl and stir in ghee, one tablespoon at a time, tasting as you go until desired flavor is reached.

One word of warning here: Keep an eye out for when the mayo thickens in the food processor, and stop pretty much straight away – if you carry on running it in a hope to get it even thicker, you’ll find it actually does the opposite; ours turned into a very runny liquid the first time we made it, and we had to throw it away and start again!

After making the second batch, I set to work mixing up a delicious Tuna-Mayo mix, which I’m really happy with. I’m going to get a little more into making my own things from scratch I think, as part of my healing mission to find more wholesome fun in everything. With the interesting puzzle of my diet combinations, it’ll be a fun challenge.