Name: Potato Yeast
Ingredients: 2 dozen large floury potatoes; ¼ pound coarse brown sugar; 1 pint yeast; water (as needed)

Why it works: Potato and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 30% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 3,032 recipes. Both carry beta-damascenone, which smells apple, rose. The science ↓

Potato Yeast

Ingredients

2 dozen large floury potatoes
¼ pound coarse brown sugar
1 pint yeast
water (as needed)

Directions

Roast the potatoes until thoroughly cooked.
Scoop out the insides and roll them with a rolling pin until fine and pulverized.
Add the brown sugar and enough water to achieve a batter-like consistency.
Mix in the pint of yeast and let it work together.
Always keep a pint of this yeast to make a fresh stock.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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.

Potato + sugartop 30% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together3,032 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

What each ingredient does

Floury potatoes: Provide starch that gives the yeast its bulk and a base for fermentation.
Brown sugar: Feeds the yeast, giving it fuel to become active and produce gas.
Yeast: Starts the fermentation that leavens the mixture.

“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.