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Potato Frill

A baked potato mixture shaped into a wall with meat inside.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Potato Frill

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the potato mixture

  1. Boil and mash the potatoes.

  2. Mix in a little milk and butter, but do not make the mixture too soft.

  3. While the mixture is hot, add one beaten egg.

Shape, bake and fill

  1. Shape the mixture into a fence around the inside of a shallow dish, fluting it with the round handle of a knife.

  2. Place in a 400°F (200°C) oven for one minute, ensuring it does not crack.

  3. Glaze quickly with butter and carefully pour the meat mince inside the wall.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

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

  4. Potato + meattop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together786 recipes

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

  5. Butter + meattop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Starch gives the mash body so it can be shaped into a wall that holds its form.
Milk
Adds moisture so the mashed potato becomes smooth and easy to shape.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a softer texture, and gives a golden glaze.
Egg
Binds the mash and sets when heated, helping the wall hold its shape.
Meat mince
Provides the savoury filling poured inside the potato wall.

The step that matters

Keep the mixture firm enough to shape. Too much milk or butter makes the mash too soft to hold a wall shape, so it may slump or crack in the oven. Adding the egg while the mash is hot helps it bind as it sets.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Potatothe original
  2. Asparagusfits about as well
  3. Leekfits less well
  4. Capsicumfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, butter, egg, meat. 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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