Creamy Garlic Aioli

How to make creamy and delicious garlic aioli in about 10 minutes. Using a whole egg instead of just egg yolk makes this homemade aioli practically fail-proof and extra easy. A must try!

What is Aioli?

Aioli is a creamy garlic sauce made with garlic, salt, olive oil, and sometimes egg. It’s popular in the cuisines of the Mediterranean coast like Provence, France, and Catalonia in Spain.

In our recipe, we include egg, which adds an extra level of richness. It is intensely flavored thanks to extra-virgin olive oil and raw garlic. We’ve provided a few tips below to help you dial in the aioli of your dreams. Let’s get to it, shall we?

How to Make Aioli From Scratch

There are many recipes online for shortcut aioli, which is using mayonnaise as a base and turning it into flavored mayo. If this is what you are looking for, we’ve got you covered. Scroll down a bit, and you’ll find our quick shortcut aioli.

What I want to talk about, though, is how to make aioli from scratch. It’s absolutely delicious (better than flavored mayo), and it’s easy! If you’ve seen our homemade mayonnaise recipe, you will notice that the method for this recipe is not all that different. We combine eggs with lemon juice, salt, and oil.

Just like with our mayo recipe, we use a whole egg. It’s common to see aioli made with just egg yolk, but we find adding a whole egg makes this recipe more foolproof, and we love the results. In addition to the whole egg, we add one egg yolk for more richness.

Then, building on that richness, we use quite a bit of oil. Traditionally, you’ll see olive oil used to make aioli. We use olive oil but often cut it with a little neutral oil like sunflower or grapeseed oil.

Olive oil can be pretty intense, and depending on the oil brand, the olive oil’s flavor can overpower the rest of the ingredients. By cutting some of that olive oil with a more neutral oil, the aioli is more balanced.

Now, with all of that said, if you have a fantastic bottle of fruity, light olive oil in your kitchen, feel free to use 100% olive oil in our recipe. Our best advice here is to taste your olive oil before choosing how much of it to add. If it tastes spicy and bitter, we recommend using some neutral oil to balance it.

On the other hand, if it tastes fruity and light, you might consider using most or all olive oil. In our recipe below, we ask that you add 3/4 cup of oil — this can be 100% olive oil or a blend. It is entirely up to you. We typically use 1/4 cup neutral oil (I like sunflower or grapeseed) and 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil.

A Little Note About Using Raw Eggs

Here’s what the CDC suggests you do to reduce any risks of using eggs:

• Consider buying and using pasteurized eggs
• Keep eggs refrigerated at 40°F (4°C) or colder at all times
• Only buy eggs from stores and suppliers that keep them refrigerated
• Discard cracked or dirty eggs

Our Tips for Making Aioli

First things first, if you are nervous about making aioli, don’t be. It’s fast and straightforward. Here are a few tips:

1. It is best when all ingredients are at the same temperature. If you have cold eggs and no time to leave them out on the counter to come to room temperature, place them into a bowl of warm water. Set the bowl aside, and you will have room-temperature eggs in 5 minutes.
2. Allow the garlic, lemon juice, and salt to sit together for a few minutes. In this time, the salt dissolves into the lemon juice, and thanks to that salt, the garlic is seasoned.
3. Slowly add the oil in tiny drops until about a quarter of the oil is incorporated. Slowly adding the oil is really important. If you were to dump it all in at once, you would have aioli soup! For a visual representation of adding the oil, watch our video for homemade mayonnaise; we add the oil at 1:30.

Shortcut Aioli

We highly recommend making aioli from scratch, however, if you are short on ingredients or do not have the equipment, here’s a quick garlic flavored mayonnaise that’s still quite delicious.

Stir 1 cup of mayonnaise with 2 to 3 finely grated garlic cloves, a generous pinch of salt, 1 to 2 teaspoons of fresh lemon juice, and a pinch of ground black pepper. Taste the mayonnaise, and then adjust the seasoning with more salt or lemon juice.

For vegan aioli, use the recipe for shortcut aioli above, but use vegan mayonnaise.

How to Serve Aioli

Use homemade aioli as a sandwich spread or use as a dip for the following things:

• Steamed or roasted asparagus
• Steamed or roasted artichokes
• Roasted vegetables like these crispy roasted potatoes
• Roasted or steamed shrimp and fish — try our roasted shrimp cocktail
• Steamed crab (snow or king crab legs and Dungeness crab are excellent)

More Garlic Recipes: If you love garlic, try our Oven Roasted Garlic. We roast whole heads of garlic in the oven until soft and sweet. Or, try making our Crispy Fried Garlic. I love it sprinkled on top of rice, salads, and noodles.