Name: Potato Nests
Ingredients: Potatoes; Oil for frying; Creamed fish, meats, or mushrooms; Parsley for garnish

Why it works: Potato and parsley are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,855 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potato Nests

Ingredients

Potatoes
Oil for frying
Creamed fish, meats, or mushrooms
Parsley for garnish

Directions

Prepare the potatoes as you would for making potato straws.
Shape the prepared potatoes into nests using a wire utensil designed for this purpose.
Fry the nests in deep oil until golden brown.
Remove the nests from the form and drain excess oil.
Fill the nests with creamed fish, meats, or mushrooms.
Garnish with parsley before serving.

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.

Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,855 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Potato + fishtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together134 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Fish + parsleytop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together2,341 recipes

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