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Mashed Potatoes

A simple dish of boiled potatoes mashed with butter, pepper, salt, and cream or rich milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Mashed Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the potatoes until tender.

  2. Mash the potatoes in a wooden bowl using a potato masher.

  3. Add butter while the potatoes are hot.

  4. Season with pepper and salt.

  5. Stir in cream or rich milk.

Serve

  1. Keep the serving dish over hot water until ready to 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. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

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

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

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

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

  4. Potato + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Butter + peppertop 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

Old potatoes
Starchy base that mashes into a fluffy, light texture.
Butter
Adds fat and richness, and coats the potatoes for a smooth mouthfeel.
Cream or rich milk
Adds moisture and fat, giving the mash a creamier, smoother texture.

The step that matters

Add butter while the potatoes are hot. Hot potatoes absorb fat and liquid more readily, so the butter melts in and the mash stays evenly rich. Cooled potatoes turn stiff and gluey when mixed.

“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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