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Fried Scallops

Fried scallops coated in seasoned cracker crumbs and beaten egg, then fried until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 106,462 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Fried Scallops

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Rinse the scallops in cold water with a little coarse sea salt and dry them with a napkin.

  2. Dip the scallops in seasoned cracker crumbs mixed with pepper and salt.

  3. Coat them in beaten egg, then dip them in the cracker crumbs again.

Fry

  1. Fry the scallops in hot fat 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. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Pepper + porktop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,121 recipes

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

  3. Scallop + porktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together34 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Scallop + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together70 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Scallops
Provide the main protein, which turns tender and sweet when cooked briefly.
Egg
Binds the cracker crumbs to the scallops so the coating stays on during frying.
Cracker crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating that browns in the hot fat.
Pork fat or cooking oil
Conducts heat to brown and crisp the coating while cooking the scallops.

The step that matters

Fry the scallops in hot fat until golden brown. The fat must be hot enough to brown the coating quickly. If it is too cool, the crumbs absorb oil and turn greasy, and the scallops overcook before the coating browns.

“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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