Why it works: Potato and pork are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,668 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓
Salt-fish Hash
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Remove skin and bones from the cold boiled salt fish and chop it finely.
Chop twice as much boiled potato as there is fish.
Slice the fat salt pork and fry it in a pan until brown, then remove it and keep it warm.
Cook the hash
In the same pan, add the minced fish and potatoes, seasoning with salt and pepper, and stir until heated through.
Press the mixture together to form a cake and let it brown on the bottom.
Turn the hash out onto a hot dish and serve with the fried pork.
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.
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Potato + porktop 5% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,668 recipes
Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).
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Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together8,305 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
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Fish + porktop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together668 recipes
Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).
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Fish + buttertop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,488 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,456 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Salt fish
- Provides the main savoury flavour and the bulk of the hash's protein.
- Boiled potatoes
- Add starch and body, binding the hash and giving it a soft, fluffy texture.
- Fat salt pork
- Renders fat for frying and adds salty, savoury flavour and crisp browning.
The step that matters
Pressing the mixture into a cake and browning the bottom. Pressing removes air and packs the fish and potato together so they hold shape, while leaving the mixture undisturbed lets the starch on the pan surface caramelise into a brown, crisp crust. Stirring during this stage would prevent that crust from forming.
“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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