Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Potato Cakes
Ingredients
Directions
The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.
Make the dough
In a bowl, combine mashed potatoes, flour, salt, melted butter, and powdered sugar.
Mix in enough milk to form a stiff paste that can be rolled out.
Roll the dough to the size and thickness of a muffin.
Bake
Bake in a quick oven at 400°F (200°C) until golden.
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.
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Butter + milktop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Potato + milktop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,611 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
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Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,456 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Flour + milktop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Flour and butter 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
- Mashed potatoes
- Provide the bulk and moist body of the dough.
- Flour
- Gives the dough structure so it holds its shape when rolled and baked.
- Melted butter
- Adds fat for tenderness and helps the cakes brown.
- Powdered sugar
- Adds sweetness and helps the surface turn golden in the oven.
- Milk
- Moistens the flour and potato so the mixture forms a rollable paste.
The step that matters
Mix in enough milk to form a stiff paste. Too much milk makes the dough sticky and hard to roll, while too little leaves it crumbly. The flour and potato need enough liquid to bind into a dough that keeps its shape.
Swap the potato
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (flour, butter, sugar, milk):
- Arrowrootfits about as well
- Sweet potatofits about as well
- Potatothe original
- Leekfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against flour, butter, sugar, milk. 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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