Name: Extra Diet
Ingredients: 2 pints water; 6 oz oatmeal; 1 pint buttermilk; 8 oz boiled meat; 20 oz potatoes; 3 oz bread; 1 pint broth (1 oz barley, 1 oz vegetables, 2 oz meat); 15 oz milk

Why it works: Potato and barley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 165 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Extra Diet

Ingredients

Directions

Make the oatmeal

In a pot, bring 2 pints of water to a boil.
Add 6 oz of oatmeal and cook until thickened.
Stir in 1 pint of buttermilk before serving.

Serve the meals

For dinner, serve 8 oz of boiled meat with 20 oz of boiled potatoes and 3 oz of bread.
Prepare 1 pint of broth by simmering 1 oz of barley, 1 oz of vegetables, and 2 oz of meat together.
For supper, serve 20 oz of potatoes with 15 oz of milk.

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.

Potato + barleytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together165 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,611 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,466 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Bread + barleytop 12% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together201 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Meat + barleytop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together224 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Oatmeal: Thickens the water into a porridge, giving the dish its body.
Buttermilk: Adds tang and creaminess to the cooked oatmeal.
Potatoes: Provide starchy bulk that fills the meal.

Swap the potato

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

Potatothe original
Asparagusfits about as well
Chivefits less well
Tomatofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against buttermilk, meat, bread, barley, milk. 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.