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Cornish Pastie

A pastry filled with meat, potato, and seasoning baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,305 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cornish Pastie

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a hot oven”. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. Cut the meat and potato into small pieces.

  3. Mix the meat, potato, seasoning, and gravy in a bowl.

Shape the pasties

  1. Roll out the pastry and cut it into a round shape using a small plate.

  2. Roll the pastry again into an oblong shape and place the meat mixture down the center.

  3. Fold the edges to form a ridge on top and prick with a fork.

Bake

  1. Bake for 30 minutes if using raw meat, or 20 minutes if using cooked meat.

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

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

  2. Meat + potatotop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together786 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  3. Pepper + meattop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,777 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Short pastry
Encloses the filling and bakes into a crisp, golden shell.
Meat
Provides the savory main filling, cooking through in the oven.
Potato
Adds bulk and a soft, starchy texture to the filling.
Gravy or water
Adds moisture so the filling stays juicy while baking.

The step that matters

Fold and seal the edges. A tight ridge keeps juices inside the pastry while baking; gaps let filling leak and dry out.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Mustardfits about as well
  3. Carrotfits about as well
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, meat. 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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