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Meat Pie

A savory pie with diced cold meat, boiled potatoes, tomatoes, and seasonings baked in pastry.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and tomato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,798 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Meat Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

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

  2. Line the sides of a baking dish with pie pastry.

Assemble and bake

  1. Layer the ingredients starting with meat at the bottom, followed by potatoes, tomatoes, and seasoning until the top of the pan.

  2. Cover with pie crust and add enough hot water to cook thoroughly without becoming dry.

  3. Bake for about 45 minutes until done.

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. Potato + tomatotop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,798 recipes

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

  2. Pepper + tomatotop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,923 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  5. Meat + potatotop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together786 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold meat
Forms the savoury filling base that gives the pie its main body and flavour.
Boiled potatoes
Add bulk and a soft, starchy texture to the filling.
Tomatoes
Add moisture and acidity that keeps the filling juicy during baking.
Pie pastry
Forms the lining and crust that holds the filling and browns in the oven.

The step that matters

Adding the hot water before covering. Hot water helps the filling heat through and cook evenly while the crust seals it in, so the pie does not dry out during baking.

Swap the tomato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits about as well
  3. Onionfits about as well
  4. Tomatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, potato, pepper, 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.

More meat pie recipes

Mince Filling 11Mince 10Cold 7French 7Crust 5Pastry 5 See all 92 →

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