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Fricasseed Potatoes

A simple potato dish cooked with cream, butter, parsley, and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and parsley are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,855 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Fricasseed Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Peel and slice the potatoes into ½-inch thick pieces.

  2. Place the potatoes in a saucepan and add enough cold water to half cover them.

Cook and serve

  1. Cover the saucepan tightly and cook for 15 minutes.

  2. Drain all the water from the potatoes.

  3. Add the cream, butter, parsley, and salt to the potatoes.

  4. Gently shake the saucepan to mix and serve.

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 + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

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

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  4. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  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 starchy body of the dish, cooking until tender and absorbing the added cream and butter.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, coating the potatoes for a smooth, silky texture.
Butter
Adds fat and flavour, helping the dish feel rich and glossy.

The step that matters

Drain all the water from the potatoes. Excess cooking water left with the potatoes would dilute the cream and butter, leaving the dish watery instead of coated and creamy. Draining thoroughly lets the fats cling to the potato surface.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Garlicfits about as well
  3. Parsleythe original
  4. Celeryfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, cream, 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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