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Potato Yeast

A yeast dough made from boiled potatoes, sugar, salt, water, and yeast.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Potato Yeast

Why it works: Potato and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 30% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Potato Yeast

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the potato base

  1. Boil the potatoes until tender, then pass them through a colander.

  2. Mix the mashed potatoes with sugar and coarse sea salt.

  3. Pour in boiling water until the mixture is as thick as pancake batter.

Ferment and store

  1. Let the mixture cool until lukewarm, then add the yeast.

  2. Allow the mixture to rise, stirring down several times while keeping it in a warm place.

  3. Once risen, transfer the mixture into jugs, cork them, and store in a cool place.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + sugartop 30% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide starch that gives the dough body and food for the yeast.
Sugar
Feeds the yeast, driving fermentation and rising.
Yeast
Ferments the mixture, producing gas that makes it rise and turn airy.
Coarse sea salt
Controls yeast activity and adds flavour.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool until lukewarm before adding the yeast. Yeast is killed by high heat, so adding it to a hot mixture can stop fermentation. Lukewarm liquid keeps the yeast alive and active enough to make the mixture rise.

“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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