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Creamed Potatoes

A creamy potato dish with butter, flour, milk, onions, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion 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 ↓

Creamed Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Make the sauce

  1. Melt the butter in a frying pan over medium heat.

  2. Once it bubbles, stir in the flour and cook for 1 minute.

  3. Gradually add the hot milk, stirring constantly until smooth.

  4. Season with salt and pepper.

Finish the potatoes

  1. Add the diced potatoes and chopped onion.

  2. Cook until the potatoes are heated through and tender.

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

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

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

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

  5. Pepper + oniontop 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 butter and milk into a smooth, creamy sauce that coats the potatoes.
Butter
Carries the flour and adds richness to the sauce.
Milk
Forms the body of the cream sauce once thickened by the flour.
Potatoes
Form the bulk of the dish and soften as they heat through in the sauce.
Onion
Adds savory flavor to the sauce as it cooks with the potatoes.

The step that matters

Gradually add the hot milk, stirring constantly until smooth. Adding liquid slowly while stirring lets the flour disperse evenly, preventing lumps. Starch granules that clump together stay dry inside and produce a grainy, uneven sauce.

Swap the onion

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

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

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