Why it works: Potato and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,456 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓
To Boil New Potatoes
Ingredients
Directions
Scrub the potatoes with a brush or coarse cloth to remove the skins.
Wash them clean and place them in boiling water without salt.
Boil gently until tender, then drain the water completely.
Sprinkle fine salt over the potatoes and give them a gentle shake.
Let them sit in the saucepan by the fire for a minute.
Optionally, add a small slice of fresh butter and toss gently until melted.
Serve immediately.
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.
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Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked 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
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