Why it works: Onion and potato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and 9,019 recipes mention both. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓
How to Use Cold Potatoes
3 personsIngredients
Directions
Make the potato cake
Mash the cold potatoes with a fork until free from lumps.
Stir in the flour, minced onions, butter, and milk, adding more milk to moisten the mixture.
Press the mashed potatoes into a mould.
Bake in a moderate oven until nicely brown (about 20 minutes to 1/2 hour).
Turn the cake out of the mould and serve.
Fry the potatoes
Peel and cut the potatoes into thin slices of nearly equal size.
Heat butter or clarified dripping in a frying pan until hot.
Add the sliced potatoes and fry them on both sides until nicely brown.
When crisp and done, remove the potatoes and place them on a cloth to drain excess grease.
Serve the fried potatoes hot, sprinkling with salt.
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 aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.
-
Onion + potatotop 2% of all pairsAroma overlapstrongMentioned together9,019 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
-
Flour + potatotop 9% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together5,160 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
-
Flour + oniontop 13% of all pairsAroma overlaplowMentioned together31,198 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and onion share little aroma chemistry, yet 31,198 recipes mention both: they likely work on texture and structure more than aroma.
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, when mashed, give the cake its body and moisture.
- Flour
- Binds the mashed potato so the cake holds its shape when turned out and baked.
- Minced onions
- Add savoury flavour and aroma to the potato cake.
The step that matters
Fry the sliced potatoes until nicely brown on both sides. The pan must be hot enough so the slices brown and crisp rather than soaking up fat and turning greasy. Turning them so both sides brown cooks the slices through evenly.
Flavor stand-ins for the onion
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, potato):
- Arrowrootbetter flavor fit
- Chivebetter flavor fit
- Carrotbetter flavor fit
- Onionthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, potato. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).
“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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