Name: Curried Potatoes
Ingredients: 1 kg organic FAIRTRADE potatoes peeled, diced and parboiled; 1 medium onion, topped, tailed, skinned and finely chopped; 1 clove garlic chopped fine or even crushed; 2.5 ml Fair Trade turmeric; 2.5 ml Fair Trade piri piri; 2.5 ml Fair Trade ground cinnamon; 2.5 ml Fair Trade ground coriander; 5 ml tomato puree; 15 ml FAIRTRADE lemon juice; 15ml fresh chopped or 5 ml dried parsley; pinch of salt; cooking oil

Why it works: Clove and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 14,189 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

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.

Clove + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together14,189 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Coriander + lemontop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,498 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Turmeric + coriandertop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,253 recipes

Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
Coriander + tomatotop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,967 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
Turmeric + cinnamontop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together1,197 recipes

Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes: Form the bulk of the dish and turn soft and starchy as they cook in the sauce.
Onion: Softens and turns golden, adding sweetness and a savoury base for the spices.
Tomato puree: Adds concentrated tomato flavour, depth and a little colour to the sauce.
Lemon juice: Adds acidity that brightens the spices and balances the sweetness of the onion.

The step that matters

Stir fry the ground spices briefly. Ground spices release their aroma and flavour when briefly fried in hot oil. Over-browning them in about a minute can turn them bitter, so keep the heat and time in check.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, clove, turmeric, cinnamon, coriander, tomato, lemon):

Capsicumfits better
Carrotfits better
Okrafits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, clove, turmeric, cinnamon, coriander, tomato, lemon. 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.

Ingredient	Portion assumed	kcal
Potato	1 medium (173g) baked	161
Olive Oil	1 tbsp (14g)	119
Onion	1 medium (110g)	44
Tomato	1 medium (123g)	22
Lemon	juice of 1 lemon (48ml)	12
Turmeric	1 tsp ground (3g)	9
Cinnamon	1 tsp ground (2.6g)	6
Garlic	1 clove (3g)	4
Parsley	1 tbsp chopped fresh (3.8g)	1
Salt	1 tsp (6g)	0
Coriander	not in our table	0

Curried Potatoes