8 Mayo Substitutes for All Your Cookout Sides (2024)

FAQs

8 Mayo Substitutes for All Your Cookout Sides? ›

Sending in some avocado in place of mayonnaise is a fresh idea. It's perfect for sandwiches, specifically a BLT, or burger to still add that fat – but pure, healthy fats. This would not be great in cooked applications, but you could put some in a food processer and add a little water or oil to make a creamy spread.

Sending in some avocado in place of mayonnaise is a fresh idea. It's perfect for sandwiches, specifically a BLT, or burger to still add that fat – but pure, healthy fats. This would not be great in cooked applications, but you could put some in a food processer and add a little water or oil to make a creamy spread.

Homemade aioli

Whether you follow the simplified method or add egg yolks to help emulsify the custard-like combination of ingredients, aioli is the most seamless substitute for mayonnaise.

The ingredient swap works so well because, like butter, mayonnaise predominantly consists of fats — so it can achieve the same golden crust on a grilled cheese or creaminess in a baked good as butter does. One of the benefits of substituting butter with mayonnaise is that the ratio is usually an easy one-to-one swap.

I've made BLTs with several brands of store-bought mayo. On occasion, I've taken gone rogue and replaced mayo with avocado, hummus, or homemade cashew cheese.

In the contest of mayo versus Miracle Whip, the latter is lower in fat and has fewer calories than mayonnaise. However, Miracle Whip's higher sugar content (from high fructose corn syrup) doesn't necessarily make it a “healthier” option.

Basically, you can use Miracle Whip dressing anywhere you use mayo — on sandwiches, in dips and for recipes. But because of its sweeter and tangier flavor, there are a few recipes in which it might not work as well. For example, if you're baking, you may want to stick with mayo because of its full-fat profile.

Mayonnaise is made of oil, eggs, and vinegar (or lemon juice). Miracle Whip has the same basic ingredients but with less oil, and the addition of water, sugar, and spices like mustard, paprika, and garlic. Even with these additions, Miracle Whip has almost half the calories of mayo and half the fat.

Trader Joe's mayonnaise is clearly meant to be a stand-in for Hellman's—they even have nearly identical packaging.

What can I replace mayo with? ›

When looking for a healthy version of mayo, you want to find one that has a cold-pressed or expeller-pressed oil, such as expeller-pressed safflower oil or cold-pressed avocado oil. Cold-pressed or expeller-pressed oils were made with the least amount of processing, meaning the oil was pressed out of the plant.

Cream cheese is notoriously versatile, balancing between sweet and savory, and has a smooth texture that makes it the perfect spread for your sandwich. Additionally, its tangy taste makes a fantastic replacement for mayonnaise, which offers a similarly zesty flavor profile.

Mayonnaise. If you have a jar of mayo in the fridge, you can use 3 tablespoons in place of one egg. "Mayonnaise has been used as an egg substitute because of its moistening properties and is best suited for cakes with strong flavors, like spice cakes and chocolate cakes," Tutunjian says.

To learn more, watch the video • An ingredient made from legumes (red lentils, black lentils or yellow peas) can replace some of the oil in mayonnaise. Varying the legume leads to greater diversity in the sensory qualities of the prepared mayonnaise.

Some healthy mayo alternatives would be using a full fat, plain Greek yogurt, mashed avocado, or just a mix of olive oil and an acidic liquid like red wine vinegar or lemon juice, like in this favorite potato salad recipe. These healthy fats also provide essential nutrients for a balanced diet, so it's a win-win.