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A Potato Support for Hot Meats

A baked potato base made with mashed potato, milk, butter, pepper, salt, and eggs, served with chops or birds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mary Ronald · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and 81,283 recipes mention both. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

A Potato Support for Hot Meats

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Add slowly to two cupfuls of well-mashed sweet or white potato, beating all the time over the fire.

  2. Add one cupful of hot milk.

  3. Add a tablespoonful of butter.

  4. Add one quarter of a teaspoonful of pepper.

  5. Add a teaspoonful of salt.

  6. Add three beaten eggs.

Mold and bake

  1. Butter well a plain mold of the shape desired.

  2. Sprinkle over it as many bread-crumbs as will stick to the butter.

  3. Turn in the puree of potatoes.

  4. Place the mold in a pan of water.

  5. Bake for thirty minutes.

Serve

  1. Turn the molded potato in the centre of a dish.

  2. Arrange chops or birds around and against it.

By Mary Ronald. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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.

  1. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  3. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together88,785 recipes

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

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Milk + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Aroma overlapmoderate
    Mentioned together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Sweet potato
Provides the starchy bulk that holds the molded shape.
Eggs
Set during baking, binding the mash into a firm, sliceable shape.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness, keeping the mash smooth rather than dry.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother, more tender texture.

The step that matters

Baking the mold in a pan of water. A water bath moderates the heat so the eggs set gently. Without it, the eggs can overcook, turning the custard-like mash grainy, rubbery, or curdled.

“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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