Name: To Mash Potatoes
Ingredients: potatoes; coarse sea salt; butter; boiling milk; 1 or 2 onions; capsicum (bell pepper)

Why it works: Capsicum and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,571 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

To Mash Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Boil the potatoes until thoroughly cooked, then peel them.
Remove any specks or hard lumps from the potatoes.
Mash the potatoes in a wooden bowl or with a fork until fine.
Sprinkle a little coarse sea salt and mix in butter or boiling milk until smooth.
Ensure the potatoes are not too wet to avoid heaviness.
For a finer texture, rub the potatoes through a colander before adding milk and butter.
For a variation, chop boiled onions and capsicum, mix with mashed potatoes, and shape as desired.
Warm the mixture in an oven or on a stove before serving.

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.

Capsicum + peppertop 2% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together34,571 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together9,023 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Potato + capsicumtop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together2,681 recipes

Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).
Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together81,283 recipes

Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).
Onion + capsicumtop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together23,390 recipes

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

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

Swap the onion

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

Tomatofits better
Carrotfits better
Asparagusfits about as well
Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, butter, milk, capsicum, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.