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Cornish Pasties

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

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 (200°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the filling

  1. Cut the beef and potatoes into small dice.

  2. In a saucepan, combine the meat, potatoes, chopped onion, cold water, and seasonings.

  3. Stew gently until tender.

Make the pastry

  1. Prepare the pastry by mixing flour, fat, and baking powder.

  2. Roll out the pastry and cut into rounds about the size of a saucer.

Assemble and bake

  1. Place a spoonful of the prepared mixture in the center of each round.

  2. Wet the edges, fold one half of the pastry over to enclose the filling, and pinch the edges to seal.

  3. Bake in a hot oven at 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

Beef steak
Provides the main filling, becoming tender through slow stewing.
Potatoes
Add bulk and moisture to the filling as they soften during stewing.
Flour
Forms the structure of the pastry that encloses the filling.
Fat
Makes the pastry tender and flaky by coating the flour particles.
Baking powder
Helps the pastry rise slightly and lighten its texture in the oven.

The step that matters

Pinching the edges to seal. A tight seal keeps juices inside the pastry while baking; a weak seal lets filling leak out and can leave the pasty dry and the crimp burnt.

Swap the onion

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

  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, pepper, 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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