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Cabbage and Potatoes

A simple mash of boiled cabbage and potatoes, enriched with butter and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cabbage and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,081 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Cabbage and Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Boil the vegetables

  1. Boil the cabbage in salted water until nearly done.

  2. Peel the potatoes and add them to the boiling cabbage.

  3. Remove the potatoes from the pot.

  4. Drain the cabbage.

Mash and serve

  1. In a saucepan, mash the potatoes and cabbage together until fine.

  2. Add the butter and cream, then season with salt and pepper.

  3. Heat the mixture over the fire, stirring until hot.

  4. Serve immediately, especially good with cold 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. Cabbage + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,081 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Cabbage + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together275 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Butter + potatotop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cabbage
Forms the bulk of the mash and adds a mild, slightly sweet vegetable flavour.
Potatoes
Starch that mashes smoothly and gives the mixture a soft, creamy body.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smoother, silkier mouthfeel.
Cream
Adds moisture and fat, softening the texture and rounding out the flavour.

The step that matters

Mash the potatoes and cabbage until fine. Cabbage and potato must be cooked through and mashed thoroughly; any firm pieces leave a coarse, uneven texture, and draining well prevents a watery mash.

Swap the cabbage

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

  1. Onionfits better
  2. Spinachfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Cabbagethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, cream, potato, 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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