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Potato Cakes

A fried dish of mashed potatoes mixed with eggs, milk, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,305 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Potato Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the potatoes until tender, then mash them finely.

  2. Mix in the chopped hard-boiled eggs, salt, pepper, and milk or cream.

Shape and fry

  1. Form the mixture into small cakes and dust both sides with flour.

  2. Heat oil in a pan and fry the cakes until they are a delicate brown.

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

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

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

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

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Potato + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,355 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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 cakes and hold them together when mashed smooth.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add richness and body to the mashed potato mixture.
Milk or cream
Adds moisture and softness to the mashed potato mixture.
Flour
Dusting helps the cakes form a light crust that browns when fried.

The step that matters

Frying the cakes. Oil must be hot enough before the cakes go in, otherwise they absorb excess oil and turn greasy. Flour-dusted surfaces brown quickly, so moderate heat keeps them golden rather than scorched.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits about as well
  3. Spinachfits about as well
  4. Potatothe original

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