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Creamed Potatoes

A buttery, flour-thickened potato dish flavored with salt, pepper, milk, and parsley.

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 ↓

Creamed Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  2. Add the flour, salt, and pepper; cook until well mixed without burning.

  3. Gradually pour in the boiling milk, beating well to prevent lumps.

Finish and serve

  1. Stir in the cubed potatoes and heat until hot.

  2. Add the chopped parsley and serve immediately.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  5. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Enriches the sauce and carries flavour while the flour cooks.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth white sauce as it cooks with the fat.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, which thickens as it heats.
Cold boiled potatoes
Provide the body of the dish, soaking up the sauce as they heat through.

The step that matters

Gradually pour in the boiling milk, beating well. Adding liquid all at once to a flour and fat mixture causes lumps, because the starch clumps before it can disperse. Pouring slowly while beating keeps the starch separated so it thickens evenly into a smooth sauce.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Cinnamonfits about as well
  4. Thymefits about as well

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