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Potato Salad

A salad of diced potatoes, onions, hard‑cooked eggs, and a butter‑flour‑milk‑egg‑vinegar sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Potato Salad

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Cook the potatoes until tender.

  2. Cut the cooked potatoes into dice.

  3. Season the potatoes with salt and pepper.

  4. Add the chopped or sliced onion and the hard-cooked eggs.

Make the dressing

  1. In a saucepan, stir the flour into the melted butter.

  2. Add the milk and cook over low heat, stirring constantly until thickened but do not boil.

  3. Stir in the whole eggs or beaten yolks and vinegar.

  4. Cook in a double boiler, stirring constantly to avoid lumps.

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. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Butter + milktop 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. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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 salad and absorb the dressing's flavour and moisture.
Flour
Thickens the melted butter and milk into a smooth, stable sauce.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour into the dressing.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the cooked dressing and helps it thicken.
Eggs
Thicken the dressing as they cook gently and add richness and structure.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the dressing and balances its richness.

The step that matters

Cooking the dressing without boiling or lumps. Egg proteins set when heated, so boiling or overheating can curdle the dressing. Constant stirring spreads heat evenly and keeps flour from clumping, giving a smooth, thickened sauce.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, pepper, egg, flour, butter, milk, vinegar. 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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