Skip to main content
Main

Cottage Pie

A baked mutton and potato pie topped with a yeast dough crust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 16 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cottage Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderately hot oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. In a deep baking dish, combine the mutton, potatoes, stock, salt, pepper, and mint.

  3. Cut the butter into small pieces and distribute it over the top.

Make the topping

  1. In a bowl, mix the mashed potato, butter, salt, pepper, cream, and egg white until light.

  2. Add the yeast powder to the flour and combine with the potato mixture to form a soft dough.

  3. Roll the dough into a round sheet about ½ inch thick and make an opening in the center.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place the dough over the pie and brush with the egg yolk.

  2. Bake for 1 hour.

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.

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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Pepper + minttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,372 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they 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

Eggs
The egg white lightens the mashed potato topping and the yolk gives the top a golden brown finish.
Rumford yeast powder
Its leavening gives the flour-and-potato topping lift so it bakes lighter rather than dense.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the mashed potato topping and the filling.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, making the mashed potato topping softer and smoother.
Mutton
Provides the savory meat base of the filling.

The step that matters

Forming the topping dough. The dough should be soft but workable; mixing the flour in gently keeps it tender, since overworking develops gluten and makes the topping tough and dense.

Swap the mint

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (mutton, potato, pepper, butter, cream, egg, flour):

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Turmericfits better
  4. Mintthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against mutton, potato, pepper, butter, cream, egg, flour. 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.

You might also like

Mutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesPotato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesPotato RollsPotato Rolls78 recipesHaricot MuttonHaricot Mutton59 recipes