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Border of Potato-paste, Garnished with Scollops of Larks and Truffles

A baked potato paste border shaped and glazed.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,015 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Border of Potato-paste, Garnished with Scollops of Larks and Truffles

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the paste

  1. Bake the potatoes until soft, then pass the pulp through a fine sieve into a dish.

  2. In a medium saucepan, combine the potato pulp, butter, egg yolks, nutmeg, pepper, and salt.

  3. Stir the mixture over low heat with a wooden spoon until it forms a smooth paste.

Shape and bake

  1. Shape the paste into a ball and place it on a baking sheet, molding it to the desired height and circumference.

  2. Mold the border like a rice casserole using a chisel‑shaped piece of raw carrot or turnip.

  3. Brush the molded border with egg wash and bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven until lightly golden.

  4. Once baked, remove some of the inside to create a cavity and smooth the edges with the back of a spoon.

  5. Keep the border in a dry place until ready to use.

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. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Potato + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  4. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

  5. Butter + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together24,377 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide the bulk of the paste, giving body and a soft, moldable structure.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, keeping the paste smooth and tender.
Egg yolks
Bind the paste and help it set firm while baking, adding richness and color.

The step that matters

Stirring the paste over low heat. Heating the potato and egg yolk mixture gently keeps the yolks from scrambling and the paste smooth. Too much heat can curdle the eggs and make the paste grainy or stiff.

Swap the potato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg, nutmeg, pepper. 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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