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Savory Hash

A hash made with cooked lentils, boiled potatoes, bread crumbs, butter, onion, and seasoning.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Sage and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,445 recipes. Both carry beta-phellandrene, which smells minty, terpene. The science ↓

Savory Hash

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. In a bowl, combine the lentils, potatoes, bread crumbs, and melted butter. Season with savory, soup powder or sage, and add the chopped onion.

Cook and serve

  1. In a frying pan, heat 1 tablespoon of butter over medium heat.

  2. Add the hash mixture to the pan, cover, and heat thoroughly.

  3. Remove the cover and let it brown, then turn out onto a platter garnished with parsley.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Sage + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,445 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Lentils + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together322 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  5. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Brown lentils
Provide the bulk and earthy body that gives the hash its substance.
Potatoes
Add starch and softness, binding the hash and giving it a tender interior.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and help the mixture hold together while it cooks.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the underside of the hash brown in the pan.
Onion
Adds aroma and savory sweetness as it cooks with the other ingredients.

The step that matters

Let it brown without stirring. Once the cover is removed, leaving the hash undisturbed lets a crust form on the bottom through browning, which adds flavor and texture. Stirring too early keeps the surface pale and soft.

Swap the lentils

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, bread, butter, sage, onion, parsley):

  1. Beansfits better
  2. Chestnutfits about as well
  3. Chickpeafits about as well
  4. Lentilsthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, bread, butter, sage, onion, parsley. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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