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Mashed Potatoes Trimmed with Small Slices of Bacon

A creamy mashed potato dish mixed with crispy bacon pieces.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,305 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Mashed Potatoes Trimmed with Small Slices of Bacon

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no cooking times; the times in the steps were added in transcription, so check for doneness rather than trusting the clock.

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Peel and cut the potatoes into chunks.

  2. Boil the potatoes in salted water until tender, about 15-20 minutes.

  3. Drain the potatoes and mash them until smooth.

Add the bacon

  1. Cook the bacon in a skillet until crispy, then chop into small pieces.

  2. Stir the bacon into the mashed potatoes and season with salt and pepper.

  3. Add butter if desired for extra creaminess.

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

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

  2. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide the starchy base that becomes soft and fluffy when mashed.
Bacon
Adds salty, smoky fat and crisp texture to the mash.
Butter
Adds fat for a richer, smoother texture.

The step that matters

Mashing the potatoes until smooth. Overworking cooked potatoes releases excess starch, which can make the mash gluey. Mash gently and stop once smooth.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatothe original
  3. Carrotfits less well
  4. Onionfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, butter. 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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