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Scalloped Potatoes

Layered mashed potatoes, eggs, butter, milk, breadcrumbs baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Scalloped Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Mix butter, milk, and salt into the hot mashed potatoes.

  3. Grease a pudding dish.

Layer

  1. Add a layer of the potato mixture.

  2. Cover with a layer of sliced hard-boiled eggs.

  3. Season with salt and pepper.

  4. Repeat layers until the dish is full, finishing with a layer of potatoes.

  5. Sprinkle bread crumbs over the top.

  6. Dot with bits of butter.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake covered until hot throughout.

  2. Uncover and brown quickly.

  3. Serve in the pudding dish.

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  4. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  5. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Mashed potatoes
Form the bulk of the dish, giving a soft, creamy body that holds the layers together.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add a firm, mild, creamy layer that contrasts with the soft potato.
Butter
Adds richness and flavor, and helps the top brown as it bakes.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the potato mixture.
Bread crumbs
Form a dry topping that browns and crisps in the oven.

The step that matters

Uncover and brown quickly. Baking covered first heats the dish through while trapping steam. Browning must be brief after uncovering, because prolonged dry heat can dry out the potatoes and scorch the crumbs before the top is golden.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, egg, butter, bread, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Potatothe original
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Tomatofits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, egg, butter, bread, pepper. 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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