Why it works: Potato and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 30% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓
Potato Yeast
Ingredients
Directions
Make the potato base
Peel and grate the potatoes quickly to prevent darkening.
Pour boiling water over the grated potatoes and cook for 30 minutes.
Add sugar and salt shortly before cooking is done.
Add yeast and rest
Once cool, stir in the yeast thoroughly.
The next day, the mixture will be light and frothy.
Use and store
Use 1 tea-cup of this yeast to raise 4 or 5 loaves of bread.
Store in a cool place and renew every fortnight in summer.
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.
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Potato + sugartop 30% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together3,032 recipes
Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Potatoes
- Starch that breaks down during cooking to feed the yeast and give the mixture body.
- Sugar
- Provides food for the yeast, helping it grow and become frothy.
- Yeast
- Live culture that ferments the sugars and makes the mixture rise and froth.
The step that matters
Grate the potatoes quickly and cook them fully. Grated potato darkens quickly when exposed to air, so working fast keeps it pale. Thorough cooking in boiling water gelatinises the starch, which the yeast can then use as food.
“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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