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Savory Hash

A hash made with canned meat, butter, flour, onion, vinegar, herbs, and mushroom ketchup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and mushroom are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 12,525 recipes. Both carry trans-2-decenal, which smells waxy, orange. The science ↓

Savory Hash

Ingredients

Directions

Make the gravy

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat.

  2. Peel and slice the onion, then add it to the butter.

  3. Stir in the flour and fry for 1-2 minutes until browned.

  4. Open the canned meat and remove the fat from the portion needed.

  5. Take 1½ pounds of meat from the can.

  6. If using all the meat, rinse the can with ½ pint of warm water to make gravy.

  7. Pour the gravy into the saucepan with the flour and butter, stirring until it boils and thickens.

  8. Move the saucepan to the side of the heat to keep warm.

Finish the sauce

  1. Finely chop the pickles and stir them or the vinegar into the sauce.

  2. Chop the parsley, marjoram, and thyme leaves finely.

  3. Add the chopped herbs to the mixture and stir well.

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 + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

  2. Onion + mushroomtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,626 recipes

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

  3. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + mushroomtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Canned meat
Provides the bulk and savory flavor of the hash.
Butter
Carries the flavor of the onion and forms the base for the sauce.
Flour
Thickens the gravy as it cooks and boils with the butter.
Onion
Adds sweetness and aroma as it softens in the butter.
Vinegar
Adds sharp acidity that brightens the rich sauce.
Mushroom ketchup
Adds savory depth to the sauce.

The step that matters

Thickening the gravy. The flour must be cooked in the butter before the liquid goes in, and the gravy must be stirred until it boils. Stirring keeps the starch dispersed so the sauce thickens smoothly without lumps.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, butter, flour, vinegar, pepper, mushroom, ketchup):

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Mustardfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, butter, flour, vinegar, pepper, mushroom, ketchup. 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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