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Scalloped Potatoes

A baked potato dish with a creamy butter‑flour sauce topped 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 ↓

Scalloped Potatoes

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Make the sauce

  1. In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat.

  2. Stir in the flour until smooth.

  3. Gradually pour in the milk, scald, and remove from heat.

Assemble and bake

  1. Slice the cold potatoes and season with salt and pepper.

  2. Grease the baking dish with butter and layer the potatoes.

  3. Pour the cooled milk mixture over the potatoes.

  4. Sprinkle cracker or bread crumbs on top.

  5. Bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven for about one hour.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  5. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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 dish, becoming tender as they bake in the milk.
Flour
Thickens the melted butter and milk into a smooth, sauce-like binder.
Milk
Forms the creamy sauce that moistens the potatoes as they bake.
Butter
Adds richness and fat to the sauce and carries flavor.
Cracker or bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden topping as they bake on the surface.

The step that matters

Scalding the milk and cooling it before pouring. Milk thickened with flour needs to be heated until it just scalds to cook the starch and thicken the sauce. Pouring it over the potatoes while still cooled, rather than hot, helps the sauce coat the slices evenly without causing the dish to cook unevenly or separate in the oven.

Swap the potato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, milk, pepper, 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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