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Escaloped Potatoes

A layered baked potato dish with cream sauce, parsley, breadcrumbs, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Escaloped 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. Slice the cold boiled potatoes very thin and season with salt and pepper.

Assemble

  1. Butter a pudding dish and cover the bottom with a layer of cream sauce.

  2. Add a layer of potatoes, sprinkle with chopped parsley, and moisten with sauce.

  3. Repeat layers until all ingredients are used, finishing with a layer of sauce.

Top and bake

  1. Top with bread crumbs, grated cheese, and small bits of butter.

  2. Bake for 20 minutes.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  4. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

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, giving it substance and a soft, tender body when baked.
Cream sauce
Moistens the potato layers and creates a rich, creamy texture as it heats.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden top layer that contrasts with the soft potatoes beneath.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the topping brown in the oven.

The step that matters

Finishing with a layer of sauce. Cooked potatoes absorb liquid slowly, so each layer needs enough sauce. Without it, the potatoes can stay dry and firm while the top browns too quickly.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, cream, sauce, parsley, bread, butter):

  1. Shallotfits about as well
  2. Capsicumfits about as well
  3. Potatothe original
  4. Carrotfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, cream, sauce, parsley, bread, butter. 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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