Vegan macaroni salad FTW

[shadowspar]

Since having to quit eating eggs on account of my youngest daughter's egg allergy, one of the dishes we've really missed is macaroni salad. The traditional family recipe calls for Miracle Whip, all varieties of which contain some amount of egg. Most of the vegan mayo substitutes try to replicate plain mayonnaise, and even it just doesn't have the same zing. Someone on one of the veggie boards pointed out that Miracle Whip is just mayo with a few additives to make it more sweet & tart, though, and further recommended tuning up some Vegenaise with a bit of sugar and cider vinegar, a strategy we used to great effect. Mixing ¾ tbsp of white sugar and ½ tbsp cider vinegar into 1½ cups of Vegenaise gives a vegan "Miracle Whip" that has about the right balance of sweet & tart, but is a bit weaker than the real thing and still missing some of the "bite". Next go 'round we'll probably try to zip things up with a bit of lemon juice or dry mustard, but this worked passably well. Use that to make a double recipe of Company's Coming Main Macaroni Salad and you are off to the races.

Comments

[kake]

I don't know if this is of interest, but seeing that there are actual eggs in that salad too, I wondered if you might miss the egg flavour a little. If so, it might be worth trying black salt instead of regular salt — it has a sulphurous flavour that I find strongly reminiscent of eggs.

[shadowspar]

Wow, I'd never heard of the stuff before. If I can track some of it down, I'll definitely give that a shot. Thanks so much for the pointer!

[kake]

Glad to be of help! I've only seen it in Indian groceries, not sure where else might sell it.

[laughingrat]

Mmm, that sounds good. Miracle Whip also has paprika, right? But I think that's just for pretty.

[shadowspar]

That's what the little red flecks are! (Now I feel dense.) Not sure how much effect it has on the overall flavour, but I've always been crap at picking out flavours out of a bouquet.

Yeah, it's a nice recipe - straightforward but good.