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Baked Hash

A baked dish of ground cold cooked meat mixed with mashed potatoes, seasoned, topped with ketchup and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Baked Hash

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 ↓

Baked Hash

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the hash

  1. Grind any kind of cold cooked meat.

  2. Mix equal parts of the ground meat and mashed Irish potatoes.

  3. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

  4. Add enough butter and milk to keep the mixture from being too stiff.

Bake and serve

  1. Transfer the mixture to a baking dish.

  2. Pour 2 tablespoons of tomato ketchup over the top.

  3. Sprinkle with bread crumbs and brown in the oven.

  4. Serve hot.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Mashed irish potatoes
Bulk and body, forming a soft, cohesive base for the hash.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, keeping the mixture moist and tender.
Milk
Adds moisture so the mixture is softer and less stiff.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden browned crust on top in the oven.
Tomato ketchup
Adds sweetness and acidity, flavoring the top layer.

The step that matters

Add enough butter and milk to keep the mixture from being too stiff.. Potatoes firm up as they cool, so enough fat and liquid is needed to keep the hash soft and cohesive. Too little makes it dry and crumbly, while too much makes it loose and slow to brown.

Swap the tomato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, potato, pepper, butter, milk, ketchup, bread. 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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