Et Tu, Saveur?

Saveur is our favorite food magazine, an exemplary publication of its kind. The beauty of Saveur's approach to food is that it almost always places food in its cultural, geographical, and historical contexts. But in a lively way, without being dry or academic. And it's not a dumb recipes-and-(fantasy)-lifestyle rag, like some we could name.

And, it always has a lot of really neat pictures.

Thus it pains us all the more to have found this lamentable example of aïoli abuse in the latest issue (March, 2009, No. 118):

Lemon Aïoli (suggested as an accompaniment to steamed artichokes)

1 egg yolk
1 tsp. dijon mustard
3/4 cup olive or grapeseed oil
1 tbsp. lemon juice
Kosher salt, to taste

This is not as bad as something like, say, maple-chili aïoli. But it is as absurd an "aïoli" as one can imagine, for it utterly lacks the essential ail, the garlic from which aïoli takes its name.

Aïoli, we repeat, is not a fancy French name for mayonnaise. Mayonnaise is the fancy French name for mayonnaise.

And aïoli is aïoli. Please.