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Potato Roll

A rolled omelet made with mashed potatoes, eggs, milk, butter, parsley, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potato Roll

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. In a saucepan, combine cold mashed potatoes, milk, salt, pepper, chopped parsley, and beaten eggs. Mix thoroughly.

  2. Remove from heat. Beat the mixture until light.

Cook the omelette

  1. In an omelet pan, melt butter over medium heat.

  2. Spread the potato mixture evenly in the pan.

  3. Cook slowly until golden brown.

  4. Roll the potatoes like an omelet.

Serve

  1. Serve hot.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

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

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

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Set and bind the potato mixture into a cohesive, sliceable omelette.
Cold mashed potatoes
Provide the bulk and body of the omelette, with a soft, tender texture.
Milk
Adds moisture and keeps the mixture soft and tender as it sets.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and helps the underside brown in the pan.

The step that matters

Cook slowly until golden brown. Medium heat lets the egg set through without scorching the bottom. Rushing it leaves the centre runny or the base burnt, which makes rolling the omelette difficult.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Dillfits less well
  4. Cinnamonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, milk, pepper, egg, 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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