Nordic Style Easy To Make Mustard And Dill Sauce

This Nordic mustard and dill sauce is best known as an accompaniment to 'Gravelax' or Smoked Salmon. All you need is honey, mustard, lemon juice, white balsamic vinegar, dill and olive oil to whisk this sauce up in less than 15 minutes!

Mustard and Dill sauce is a Scandinavian classic best known to be served with cured 'Gravelax' salmon. This sauce is a great option for an endless variety of appetizers! Let us show you how easy this is to make😉

Which Ingredients do I need?

Most ingredients for this Nordic Mustard and Dill sauce, are a common staple in any kitchen pantry. If you don't have fresh dill on hand, you can use frozen or dry dill.

Similar to making mayonnaise from scratch, we are using a technique called: Emulsifying. This means combining two ingredients that usually do not mix together easily.

Usually, it is a fat or oil and a water based liquid like vinegar or water itself. Without an emulsifier, the sauce will split! Some common emulsifiers used to stabilize emulsions are egg yolks, butter, cheese, mustard or honey.

We are using Mustard and Honey in the emulsification and this will also bind all the remaining ingredients. For mustard, I have used Dijon but if you prefer wholegrain mustard, that's completely fine. Both work well!

As for the honey, use a runny one😁

To give the sauce some acidity, I added lemon juice and white balsamic vinegar. Yes that's not very Nordic🙄but it works beautifully! Alternatively, you can swap the white balsamic vinegar with apple cider vinegar or white wine vinegar.

Olive oil, is a great oil for emulsifications and is tasty too. Other oils that can be used are, grapeseed oil or canola oil.

How to make Nordic Mustard and Dill Sauce

Combine the honey, mustard, lemon juice, white balsamic vinegar, dill and a pinch of salt in a bowl. Drip the oil slowly into the bowl and whisk in a circular motion.

Best to whisk the area where the oil falls onto the honey mustard for it to emulsify. When the mixture starts to thicken up, you can increase the flow of olive oil.

After you have used up all the oil, check the consistency of the mixture. It should be like a thick dressing, almost like mayonnaise. Incase the mixture looks too thick, add some water to it but if it looks thin, then add more olive oil to it👨🏻‍🍳

Finish the sauce with a squeeze of lemon and add salt if needed.

What can you do to fix a split sauce?

Unfortunately, emulsions can split if you accidentally add the oil too fast! It is not unusual as it can happen to anyone! Here is a quick trick to fix your split sauce 👨🏻‍🍳

Add a small amount of honey and mustard in a clean bowl. Next, add olive oil and whisk until the sauce emulsifies. Now you can add the split sauce slowly into this base emulsion whilst continuing whisking. That will do the job😊

What Else Can You Use Mustard And Dill Sauce For?

Sweet and tangy, finished with chopped dill, this well balanced sauce can be used in many different ways. Add to steamed vegetables, boiled potatoes, sliced avocado, salmon, ham or just simply use as a dressing for your salad. It works well with everything😋

One of our favorite ways to combine mustard and dill sauce, is with seafood. Think poached prawns, like a prawn cocktail or with smoked salmon on rye bread. We made these stunning canapes with beetroot cured Gravelax on lavash crackers. You can find a great recipe for cured salmon here. We highly recommend serving these canapes on your next gettogether🙂

As a tip: The sauce keeps well for 2-3 weeks, so it might be handy to have a bottle of this great recipe ready to go in your fridge.