Name: Potato Bread
Ingredients: equal parts boiled and mashed potatoes; equal parts flour; milk (optional, for milk bread); water (optional, for wetting)

Why it works: Potato and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,611 recipes. Both carry (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal, which smells cucumber, melon. The science ↓

Potato Bread

Ingredients

equal parts boiled and mashed potatoes
equal parts flour
milk (optional, for milk bread)
water (optional, for wetting)

Directions

Prepare the dough

Boil the potatoes until tender and mash them smoothly.
Combine equal parts of the mashed potatoes and flour.
If making milk bread, use boiled milk instead of water for wetting.
Mix the ingredients as you would for regular bread.

Shape and bake

Shape the dough into loaves, twists, or rolls.
Bake until golden 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.

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.

Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together3,611 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together11,466 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together78,219 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Potato + flourtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,355 recipes

Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Potato + breadtop 15% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together434 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

Flour and milk 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: Add moisture and softness to the crumb, and help the bread stay tender.
Flour: Provides the structure that holds the dough together and sets as it bakes.
Milk: Adds richness and softness, and helps the crust brown when used for milk bread.