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Potato Timbale

A baked potato dish shaped in a mold, seasoned with nutmeg, butter, eggs, and coated with breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Potato Timbale

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a moderate oven”. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Wash, peel, and cook the potatoes in water or steam them.

  2. Once cooked, drain and dry the potatoes over low heat, then pass them through a fine sieve.

  3. Put the potato puree into a clean saucepan and season with salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

Make the mixture

  1. Add the butter, whole egg, 3 yolks, and whisked egg whites to the puree and mix well.

Bake and serve

  1. Butter a charlotte mold and coat it with bread crumbs.

  2. Fill the mold with the potato mixture and bake in a 350°F (175°C) oven for 30 minutes.

  3. Unmold the timbale onto a hot dish and serve.

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 + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Potato + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  5. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked 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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Mealy potato starch and purée form the bulk and soft, light body of the timbale.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, giving the custard-like mixture a tender, smooth texture.
Eggs
Whole eggs, yolks and whites set the mixture when baked, giving it structure and holding its shape.

The step that matters

Drain and dry the potatoes thoroughly before sieving. Excess water dilutes the purée and makes the mixture loose, so the timbale may not set firmly when baked and may turn out wet or collapse.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, nutmeg, butter, egg, bread):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, nutmeg, butter, egg, bread. 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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