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Dessert

Common Diet

A daily diet plan including porridge, milk, meat, potatoes, tea, bread, and specified portions for males and females.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,052 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓

Common Diet

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Prepare 1 pint of porridge and serve with ½ cup of milk.

  2. Brew 1 pint of tea.

Cook the meat

  1. Cook 6 oz. of beef or mutton by roasting or boiling, depending on the day.

  2. Serve with potatoes.

  3. Ensure each male has 6 oz. of bread and 6 oz. of meat daily, while each female has 5 oz. of meat.

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. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  2. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  3. Potato + teatop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together136 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Milk + teatop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together738 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

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

What each ingredient does

Beef or mutton
Provides protein and fat, adding savoury richness to the meal.
Potatoes
Supply starch and bulk, making the meal filling alongside the meat.
Porridge
Gives a thick, starchy base that holds the milk and fills the diner.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, beef, tea, bread, meat):

  1. Potatothe original
  2. Tomatofits about as well
  3. Capsicumfits less well
  4. Asparagusfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, beef, tea, bread, meat. 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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