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Hominy Croquettea

A fried ball made from boiled hominy, butter, egg, and sugar, dusted in flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Hominy Croquettea

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a bowl, combine boiled hominy, melted butter, stiff egg, and sugar.

  2. Form the mixture into balls and dust with flour.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat deep lard in a pan and fry the balls until golden brown.

  2. Remove and drain on paper towels 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.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Butter + sugartop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Boiled hominy
Forms the main body of the croquette, giving it a soft, starchy interior.
Stiff egg
Binds the mixture together so the balls hold their shape during frying.
Melted butter
Adds richness and moisture to the interior of the croquettes.
Sugar
Adds mild sweetness and helps the surface brown during frying.

The step that matters

Frying the balls until golden brown. The lard must be hot enough to crisp the flour-dusted surface quickly. If it is too cool, the balls absorb more fat and turn greasy and may fall apart before the outside sets.

“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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