Name: A Hash of Cold Boiled Potatoes
Ingredients: cold boiled potatoes; skinned green onions; chopped parsley; pepper; coarse sea salt; butter; vegetable broth or mushroom liquor

Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

A Hash of Cold Boiled Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

Pare the potatoes to the size of thick corks and cut them into slices half an inch thick.

Cook

In a stewpan, combine the potato slices with skinned green onions, chopped parsley, pepper, coarse sea salt, and butter.
Moisten with vegetable broth or mushroom liquor.
Shake or stir on the fire until the herbs are cooked.

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.

Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,122 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,023 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together2,855 recipes

Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).
Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together12,525 recipes

Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).
Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together25,843 recipes

Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold boiled potatoes: Form the bulk of the hash, holding their shape while being sliced and warmed.
Butter: Adds richness and helps the potato slices brown lightly in the pan.
Vegetable broth or mushroom liquor: Supplies moisture so the hash warms through without drying out.
Skinned green onions: Contribute a mild, fresh onion aroma and flavour.

Swap the onion

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

Carrotfits better
Shallotfits better
Chivefits better
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, parsley, pepper, butter, mushroom. 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.