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Potato Sausage

A fried patty made from cold veal and mashed potato seasoned with pepper and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,305 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Potato Sausage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Combine the finely chopped cold veal and cold mashed potato in a bowl.

  2. Season with pepper and coarse sea salt to taste.

Cook

  1. Form the mixture into small cakes and dust them with flour.

  2. Heat oil or butter in a pan and fry the cakes until they are light brown.

  3. Optionally, fry them in sausage gravy if available.

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

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

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

  4. Potato + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,355 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Cold veal
Provides the meaty base and savory flavor of the cakes.
Cold mashed potato
Binds the mixture and adds moisture and body to the cakes.
Flour
Dusting helps the outside of the cakes brown and crisp in the pan.

The step that matters

Frying the cakes until light brown. Frying over moderate heat browns the surface through the Maillard reaction, adding flavor and a crisp crust. Cakes that are not fully set may break apart, so handle them gently while they firm up.

Swap the potato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, pepper, flour, 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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