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Meat Scallop

A baked casserole of chopped meat in a roux, topped with mashed potatoes and optional egg white.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato 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 ↓

Meat Scallop

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the filling

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan and sauté the minced onion until hot.

  2. Add the flour and stir until smooth.

  3. Gradually add the hot water, seasoning with salt and pepper.

  4. Mix in the chopped cold meat.

  5. Transfer the mixture to a baking dish.

Top and bake

  1. Cover the mixture with a layer of seasoned mashed potatoes.

  2. Wet the mashed potatoes with a little milk.

  3. Fold the beaten egg white into the mashed potatoes (optional).

  4. Bake at 400°F (200°C) for 20 minutes or until golden brown.

Serve

  1. Serve hot.

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. Onion + potatotop 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. Onion + peppertop 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

Flour
Thickens the hot water into a smooth, sauce-like binder for the meat.
Cold meat
Forms the main filling, providing savory flavor and substance.
Mashed potato
Forms a soft topping that covers the filling and browns in the oven.
Egg white
Adds structure and helps the potato topping set and brown when baked.
Butter
Adds fat and richness while cooking the onion.

The step that matters

Gradually add the hot water to the flour. Adding the liquid slowly while stirring keeps lumps from forming, so the flour blends into a smooth, evenly thickened base instead of clumping.

Swap the onion

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

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

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