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Drink

Potato Yeast

A fermented potato beverage made with boiled potatoes, flour, sugar, salt, brewer's yeast, and boiling water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Hatfield (Mass.). Congregational Church · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
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Potato Yeast

Why it works: Flour and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 92,116 recipes. Both carry phenylacetaldehyde, which smells hawthorne, honey. The science ↓

Potato Yeast

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. Combine 4 large boiled potatoes, 3 tablespoons flour, 2 tablespoons sugar, and 1 tablespoon salt. Mix thoroughly.

  2. Pour boiling water over the mixture and strain.

Add yeast and bottle

  1. When cool, add 1 cent's worth brewer's yeast.

  2. Bottle the mixture.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

665Calories
17 gProtein
1 gFat
145 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 3 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Potato1 medium (173g) baked161
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Hatfield (Mass.). Congregational Church. 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. See the original page.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  2. Flour + potatotop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,355 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Sugar + potatotop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,032 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide starch and body, and supply the sugars and nutrients that feed the yeast.
Flour
Adds starch that thickens the mixture and gives the yeast more material to work on.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast, producing the gas and fermentation that make the starter active.

The step that matters

Add the yeast only when the mixture is cool. Yeast is a living fungus. Boiling-hot liquid kills yeast cells, so adding it too early stops fermentation before it starts. Waiting until the mixture is cool lets the yeast survive and grow.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, sugar):

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Beetrootfits better
  3. Sweet potatofits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, sugar. 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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