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Potato Purine

A baked potato purée made with stock, nutmeg, pepper, butter, and optional beaten egg.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and nutmeg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,052 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potato Purine

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.

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Peel and quarter the potatoes, then wash them.

  2. Place the potatoes in a saucepan and cover with cold water. Sprinkle a little coarse sea salt over the potatoes.

  3. Boil for 30 minutes, then drain the potatoes.

Make the purée

  1. Rub the drained potatoes through a fine sieve into a saucepan.

  2. Add the strong stock, nutmeg, salt, white pepper, and butter. Stir briskly over the heat.

  3. Pile the purée on a hot dish. Optionally, smooth the surface with a knife.

Bake and serve

  1. Brush the surface with beaten egg.

  2. Bake in a 400°F (200°C) oven for about 15 minutes until the surface is nicely browned.

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 + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Nutmeg + white peppertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,375 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  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. Nutmeg + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the bulk of the purée, giving it a soft, smooth body once sieved.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother, silkier mouthfeel.
Strong stock
Adds savoury depth and flavour to the purée.
Beaten egg
Coats the surface so it browns evenly in the oven.

The step that matters

Rub the drained potatoes through a fine sieve. Pushing hot, well-drained potatoes through a sieve breaks them into fine particles without overworking the starch. Overworking or leaving lumps makes the purée gluey or uneven in texture.

Swap the white pepper

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

  1. Cinnamonfits better
  2. Parsleyfits better
  3. Thymefits better
  4. White pepperthe original

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