The transient flow of mayonnaise is described by a three‐parameter model which is a slight modification of a model developed by Larson for polymer melts with wide molecular weight distribution. It is demonstrated that despite the fact that the model has only three parameters it gives a very reasonable description of the stress overshoot phenomenon with respect to both the stress magnitude and the time at which the peak stress is reached. It is also shown that the damping constant, presumably a shear rate‐independent parameter, is in reality a weak function of the latter. Since the fit of the stress‐time curve is not highly sensitive to the magnitude of the damping parameter this difficulty can be overcome by using a mean value over the pertinent range of rates.