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Cornish Pasties

A pastry filled with diced steak, potatoes, and onion, baked until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 ↓

Cornish Pasties

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare the filling

  1. Cut the meat into dice.

  2. Wash, peel, and parboil the potatoes, then cut them.

  3. Chop the onion finely.

Make the crust

  1. In a bowl, mix the flour with a little salt, then rub in the dripping until it resembles breadcrumbs.

  2. Add the baking powder and enough cold water to form a stiff paste.

  3. Flour the board and roll out the crust to about ½ inch thick.

  4. Cut into squares of 7 or 8 inches.

Fill, shape and bake

  1. Place a little meat, potato, and onion on each square.

  2. Wet one half with a little water, fold it over the other half, and pinch the edges with your thumb and finger.

  3. Place the pasties on a greased or floured baking sheet and bake in a hot oven (400°F / 200°C) for about 1 hour.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  3. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

  5. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 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
Forms the structure of the crust once mixed with water and baked.
Dripping
Rubbed into the flour to make the crust tender and flaky.
Potatoes
Add body and moisture to the filling as they cook through.
Steak
Provides the rich, savoury meat filling that cooks inside the pastry.
Baking powder
Helps the crust rise slightly and lighten its texture in the oven.

The step that matters

Pinching the edges closed. A tight, well-sealed edge keeps the juices from leaking out during baking and keeps the filling moist. Wetting the edge first helps the dough stick together.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Carrotfits about as well
  3. Capsicumfits about as well
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, potato, flour, 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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