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Scalloped Potatoes

A baked potato dish layered with butter, cream, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. 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.

Prepare

  1. Peel and thinly slice the raw potatoes.

Assemble

  1. Layer the potatoes in a baking dish, seasoning each layer with salt, pepper, and butter.

  2. Continue layering until the dish is full.

  3. Pour cream or milk over the top, then sprinkle with bread crumbs and add a small piece of butter.

Bake and serve

  1. Bake at 350°F (175°C) for one hour and 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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  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. Potato + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together434 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Raw potatoes
Form the bulk of the dish and soften into a tender, starchy body as they bake.
Cream or milk
Provides liquid that cooks into a creamy sauce around the potato slices.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the top brown lightly in the oven.
Bread crumbs
Form a topping that adds texture and helps the surface brown.

The step that matters

Pour cream or milk over the top, then sprinkle with bread crumbs and add a small piece of butter.. The liquid needs to reach down between the layers so the potatoes cook evenly and the sauce thickens as starch releases. Adding it before the crumb topping and butter keeps the surface from drying out before the potatoes are tender.

Swap the potato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter, cream, bread. 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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