Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
Riced Potatoes
Ingredients
Directions
Mash the potatoes until fine using a wooden masher.
For each pint of potatoes, add ½ teaspoon of coarse sea salt, pepper, hot milk to moisten, and enough butter for flavor.
Stir and beat with a wire masher until light and creamy white.
If available, use cream instead of milk and butter.
Press the mashed potatoes through a potato ricer into the serving dish.
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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Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together81,283 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together41,516 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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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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Potato + milktop 9% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together3,611 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
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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
- Potatoes
- Form the bulk of the dish, and mashing them breaks down starch to create a smooth base.
- Hot milk
- Moistens the mashed potatoes and loosens their texture for a creamy result.
- Butter
- Adds fat for richness and flavor, and helps give the potatoes a smooth mouthfeel.
The step that matters
Beating the potatoes until light and creamy. Overworking potatoes can release too much starch, making them gluey. Beat just until light and smooth, and add the hot liquid gradually so the texture stays fluffy rather than dense.
“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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