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Maitre D'hotel Potatoes

A side dish of boiled potato cubes tossed with butter, lemon juice, salt, pepper, and parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Hamilton, Ohio. First Methodist Episcopal church. [from old catalog] · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and lemon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,230 recipes. Both carry 2-nonenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Maitre D'hotel Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Cook the potatoes

  1. Cook 2 cups of potato cubes (1/2 inch) in boiling salted water until soft. Drain.

Season and serve

  1. Add 3 tablespoons butter and pepper.

  2. Add 1 teaspoon lemon juice and 3/2 teaspoon finely chopped parsley.

  3. Add 2 teaspoons salt.

  4. Serve with fish.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

275Calories
5 gProtein
12 gFat
41 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 4 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Potato1 medium (173g) baked161
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

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

By Hamilton, Ohio. First Methodist Episcopal church. [from old catalog]. 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.

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. Potato + lemontop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,230 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  2. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes (in the method)
Form the bulk of the dish; cooking until soft gives them a tender, mashable texture.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, coating the potatoes and carrying flavor.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity that brightens the buttery flavor.

The step that matters

Cook the potatoes until soft, then drain. Cooking until just soft keeps the cubes intact and tender. Overcooking breaks down their starch and leaves them waterlogged and mushy, and draining well keeps excess water from diluting the butter and lemon.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Coconutfits better
  2. Mangofits about as well
  3. Plumfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, butter. 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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