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Scalloped Potatoes

A baked potato dish layered with a white sauce and topped with cracker crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and parsley are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,855 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Scalloped Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the sauce

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  3. Stir in the flour and cook until thick.

  4. Gradually add the milk, stirring constantly until the sauce thickens.

  5. Remove from heat and stir in the chopped parsley.

Assemble and bake

  1. In a baking dish, layer the sliced cooked potatoes and white sauce alternately.

  2. Top with cracker crumbs.

  3. Bake until browned on top.

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 + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

  2. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Cooked potatoes
Form the bulk of the dish and absorb the sauce as it bakes.
Milk
Liquid base that cooks with the flour into a thickened white sauce.
Flour
Thickens the butter and milk into a smooth sauce.
Butter
Fat that cooks with the flour to start the sauce and adds richness.
Cracker crumbs
Form a crisp, browned topping in the oven.

The step that matters

Stir the sauce constantly as the milk goes in. Flour thickens milk only when it is stirred while heating; if the milk is added without constant stirring, lumps form and the sauce stays thin or grainy.

Swap the parsley

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

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

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