The capricious sauce is a very easy and fairly quick condiment, ideal for accompanying, stuffing and giving an extra touch to appetizers, meats, fish, fried foods, sandwiches, flatbreads, eggs, cold cuts, raw or boiled vegetables (cabbage tops, celery stalks, tomatoes, and anything else our imagination suggests). It contains no gluten or lactose. It should be prepared in advance, at least one day prior, to enjoy it at its best. It’s never missing from my Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve table and disappears quickly to my great satisfaction; I also prepare it for dinners and buffets. It is my personal reinterpretation of the much more famous ‘capricious salad’. The capricious sauce was born from an error in the procedure of the original recipe given to me by a dear friend of mine, but the result was so pleasing that I have been making it this way ever since.
- Difficulty: Very Easy
- Cost: Economical
- Rest time: 1 Day
- Preparation time: 20 Minutes
- Portions: 10
- Cooking methods: Stove
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: All seasons
Ingredients
- 1 cup mayonnaise
- 1 1/2 cups mixed pickled vegetables
- 3 oz tuna in water (or in oil)
- 2 fillets anchovies in oil
- 3 1/2 oz boiled potatoes
- 1 boiled carrot
- 1/2 cup peas, canned, drained
- 10 pitted green olives
Tools
- 1 Blender / Mixer
Steps
Let’s start by boiling the potato with its skin (well washed) along with the carrot. They must be perfectly cooked and very soft. Let them cool; then, after peeling the potato, pass the two vegetables through a potato masher twice; the capricious sauce will benefit in creaminess.
The boiled potato and carrot, added to the sauce, serve to soften both the acidity of the pickled vegetables and the strong saltiness of the anchovies and tuna.
In the meantime, drain the pickles, rinse them under running water, and let them drain in a colander.
Prepare a fridge container with a lid to store the sauce. You can also store it in 2 sterilized jars (perhaps reusing the mayonnaise and pickle jars).
Finely chop only half of the pickles and place them in the chosen container for the capricious sauce.
In a bowl, combine the other half of the pickles, the tuna, anchovy fillets, half of the peas, half of the pitted olives, and 2-3 generous tablespoons of mayonnaise.
Using an immersion blender or a traditional blender, mix everything until a smooth cream is obtained; lastly, add the mashed potatoes and carrots and blend them into the cream. Transfer the cream obtained into the container and mix it with the chopped pickles and the rest of the mayonnaise. Finally, decorate the surface of the capricious sauce with pickled carrot bits and the remaining peas and olives.
Store the capricious sauce in the fridge and let it rest and absorb flavors for at least one day (though it’s difficult, at least for me, to resist the temptation to taste it continuously).
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Extra Idea. Wash and dry the leaves of a Belgian endive gently. Arrange them on a serving plate and fill them with a bit of capricious sauce, leaving part of the leaf free for guests to hold it like a spoon and enjoy it without difficulty. You can create a tasty and beautiful appetizer by arranging the endive leaves decoratively. Each guest can serve themselves.
