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Potato and Bacon Pie

A baked pie of sliced potatoes and bacon, seasoned with salt, pepper, nutmeg, cream, and eggs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,015 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potato and Bacon Pie

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderately hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

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

Prepare

  1. Slice the potatoes and mix them with the bacon.

  2. Season with salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

  3. Moisten the mixture with cream and beaten eggs.

Bake and serve

  1. Pour into a pie dish and bake at 350°F (175°C) for about 1 hour.

  2. Serve hot.

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

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Nutmeg + creamtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,920 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

  5. Potato + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,481 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the bulk of the pie, becoming tender and starchy as they bake.
Bacon
Adds savory fat and flavour that seasons the potato layers as they cook.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set when baked, giving the pie a sliceable structure.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, helping the custard-like filling stay soft and creamy.

The step that matters

Moisten the mixture with cream and beaten eggs. The liquid must coat the potato and bacon evenly. Eggs set as they heat, so too little liquid leaves the pie dry and crumbly, while uneven mixing leaves pockets of unset custard.

Swap the potato

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

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

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