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Veal Croquettes II

Veal croquettes are fried, cone-shaped meat cakes made from veal, milk, butter, flour, onion juice, spices, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 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 ↓

Veal Croquettes II

Ingredients

Directions

Make the veal binder

  1. In a saucepan, bring the milk or cream to a boil.

  2. In a bowl, mix the butter and flour to a smooth paste.

  3. Stir the paste into the boiling milk and cook until thickened.

  4. Remove from heat and mix in the chopped veal, onion juice, salt, nutmeg, and cayenne.

  5. Transfer the mixture to a plate and let it cool until firm.

Shape and fry

  1. Shape the cooled mixture into cone-shaped croquettes.

  2. Dip each croquette in beaten egg, then coat with bread crumbs.

  3. Fry in hot oil or fat until golden brown.

  4. Serve immediately.

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

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

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour 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

Veal
Provides the main filling, and its protein sets firmly as the mixture cools and cooks.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth white sauce that holds the croquette together.
Milk or cream
Forms the liquid base of the sauce, adding moisture and a tender, creamy texture.
Butter
Adds fat and richness to the sauce and helps it stay smooth.
Egg
Coats the croquettes so the bread crumbs stick and form a crisp outer layer.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool until firm before shaping. A warm, soft mixture cannot hold a cone shape and may split or slump. Once the starch-thickened sauce and proteins have set as it cools, it becomes firm enough to shape and bread without falling apart in hot oil.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, 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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