Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓
Potato Pudding
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 the batter
Cream the butter in a bowl.
Rub the lemon peel into the sugar and pound it, then add to the butter.
Gradually mix in the egg yolks.
Slowly add the potato flour while mixing.
Beat the egg whites until stiff and fold them into the mixture.
Bake and serve
Butter a mold and coat it with breadcrumbs.
Pour the mixture into the mold and bake at 350°F (175°C) for one hour.
Turn it out and serve hot.
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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Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together124,287 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Butter + potatotop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,456 recipes
Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
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Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together92,116 recipes
Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).
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Potato + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together5,355 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Butter
- Adds richness and a tender, moist crumb through its fat content.
- White loaf sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and helps create a soft, tender texture.
- Egg yolks
- Add richness and emulsify the batter, binding it into a smooth mixture.
- Potato flour
- Gives a light, delicate body and a tender crumb in the baked pudding.
- Egg whites
- Whipped to stiff peaks, they trap air that lifts and lightens the pudding as it bakes.
The step that matters
Folding in the beaten egg whites. Stiff whites hold the air that makes the pudding light. Folding gently keeps that air in; stirring or overmixing deflates the batter and yields a dense pudding.
Swap the potato
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, egg, flour):
- Chivefits better
- Leekfits better
- Shallotfits better
- Potatothe original
Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, egg, flour. 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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