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Chicken Croquettes

Fried shaped chicken mixture coated in cracker crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Chicken Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Heat the milk in a double boiler.

  2. Cream the butter and flour together, then add to the milk.

  3. Stir in the onion juice, salt, nutmeg, and pepper; cook until thick.

Shape and fry

  1. Pour the sauce over the chopped chicken and mix thoroughly.

  2. Let the mixture cool, then form into shapes.

  3. Dust lightly with flour, dip in beaten eggs, and roll in cracker crumbs.

  4. Fry in deep lard until golden brown.

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

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

  2. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  3. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Chicken + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,814 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 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

What each ingredient does

Cold cooked chicken
Forms the bulk of the croquettes and gives them their savory flavor and filling.
Butter
Enriches the sauce and adds richness and flavor to the filling.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a sauce that holds the chicken together when cooled.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, giving it a smooth, creamy body.
Beaten eggs
Bind the coating so the cracker crumbs adhere before frying.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before forming. The sauce must set firm enough to hold its shape; shaping a warm, loose mixture makes the croquettes slump and break apart in the frying fat.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Potatofits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chicken, milk, butter, flour, nutmeg, pepper, egg. 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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