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Turnips, Mashed

Mashed turnips with butter, salt, pepper, sugar, optional nutmeg or mustard, flour or thick white sauce for thickness.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Turnip and flour match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,874 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Turnips, Mashed

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the turnips

  1. Wash and peel the turnips.

  2. Steam the turnips until tender.

Mash and season

  1. Mash the turnips with a fork or pass them through a sieve.

  2. Return the mashed turnips to a dry saucepan.

  3. Add butter, salt, pepper, sugar, and nutmeg or mustard if desired.

  4. Stir for 1-2 minutes until heated through.

  5. For a thicker consistency, stir in flour or thick white sauce before serving.

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. Turnip + flourtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,874 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  3. Turnip + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together377 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Nutmeg + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Turnip + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,252 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

What each ingredient does

Turnips
Form the main body of the dish, giving it its bulk and mild sweetness when cooked.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, making the mash smooth and silky on the palate.
Sugar
Adds a touch of sweetness that balances the turnip's natural bitterness.
Flour
Thickens the mash and gives it a firmer, less watery texture when used.

The step that matters

Drying the turnips in the saucepan. Returning the mash to a dry saucepan lets excess moisture evaporate, so the purée is thick rather than watery. Stirring for 1-2 minutes also heats it through evenly before serving.

Swap the nutmeg

The recipe marks nutmeg as optional. How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (turnip, butter, pepper, sugar, flour, sauce):

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Cinnamonfits about as well
  3. Parsleyfits about as well
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against turnip, butter, pepper, sugar, flour, sauce. 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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