AIOLI IS ALL ABOUT the garlic. This pungent sauce—often considered merely an excuse to eat the hallowed bulb—is not for the timid. Prepared properly, the rich and creamy condiment literally reeks of garlic.

In "Lulu's Provençal Table," legendary food writer Richard Olney's 1994 memoir of befriending and dining with Lulu Peyraud, proprietor of vineyard Domaine Tempier and producer of some of Provence's best wines and meals, the author writes about falling hard for the traditional sauce affectionately referred to as "the butter...