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Mince Served with Mashed Potatoes

A dish of minced meat served over mashed potatoes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Mince Served with Mashed Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Wash and scrub the potatoes well in cold water.

  2. Peel the potatoes and remove any eyes or black specks.

  3. Place the potatoes in a saucepan and cover with cold water, adding 1 teaspoon of salt.

Boil and drain

  1. Boil the potatoes for 20 to 30 minutes until tender, checking tenderness with a fork.

  2. Drain the water and let the potatoes steam with the lid half on.

Mash and season

  1. In a small saucepan, heat 1 oz of butter and 1 tablespoon of milk until boiling.

  2. Mash the potatoes smoothly with a spoon or fork, or pass them through a wire sieve for a lump-free texture.

  3. Pour the boiling milk into the mashed potatoes and stir until smooth.

  4. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Butter + mushroomtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together12,525 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-decenal (waxy, orange).

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

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

  4. Potato + mushroomtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together968 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide the starch that gives the mash its soft, fluffy body once cooked and mashed.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, silky mouthfeel to the mash.
Milk
Adds moisture and creaminess, loosening the mash and making it smooth.
Mushroom ketchup
Adds savoury, umami depth to the mash.

The step that matters

Mashing the potatoes with the hot milk and butter. Overworking cooked potato releases starch and makes the mash gluey, so mash gently and stop once smooth. Adding the milk and butter hot keeps the mash warm and lets it absorb the liquid evenly, avoiding lumps.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (meat, butter, milk, mushroom, ketchup, pepper):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatothe original
  3. Shallotfits about as well
  4. Tomatofits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against meat, butter, milk, mushroom, ketchup, 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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