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Chicken Croquettes

Chicken croquettes made from boiled chicken, mashed potatoes, eggs, mustard, catsup, butter, celery, milk, coated in egg and breadcrumbs, fried in lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Home for the Friendless (Chicago, Ill.) · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,015 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Chicken Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chicken

  1. Boil four and one-half pounds of chicken, then chop finely.

  2. Moisten the chopped chicken to a thick pulp with the cooking liquid.

  3. Take cold fowl or fresh meat of any kind, with slices of ham, fat, and lean; chop all together very finely.

  4. Add half as much grated bread as the meat.

  5. Season with salt, pepper, and nutmeg.

  6. Add one tablespoon of catsup, one teaspoon of made mustard, and one lump of butter.

  7. Mix well together.

Make the mixture

  1. Mix the chicken pulp with a pint and a half of mashed potatoes, beaten to a cream.

  2. Add three eggs, one teaspoon of mustard, sweet marjoram, salt, and pepper to taste.

  3. Add a little finely chopped celery.

  4. Soften the mixture with milk until very soft, then add a quarter pound of butter.

Shape and fry

  1. Mold the mixture into forms.

  2. Shape into little rolls or balls.

  3. Dip the molded croquettes in egg and cracker dust.

  4. Dip the rolls in beaten yolks of eggs.

  5. Cover with grated bread crumbs.

  6. Fry the croquettes in boiling lard.

  7. Fry the rolls brown in lard.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

366Calories
38 gProtein
22 gFat
4 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 7 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Chicken100g cooked165
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Mustard1 tsp (5g) yellow3
Salt1 tsp (6g)0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Home for the Friendless (Chicago, Ill.). 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. See the original page.

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. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  2. Mustard + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,019 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Mustard + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 recipes

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

  4. Chicken + mustardtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,192 recipes

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

  5. Chicken + buttertop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,902 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

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

What each ingredient does

Chicken
Forms the bulk of the croquette and gives its main flavour.
Mashed potatoes (in the method)
Adds body and softness so the mixture holds together while shaping.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and form a coating that helps crumbs adhere.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the soft interior.
Grated bread (in the method)
Absorbs moisture and gives the mixture firmness for shaping.

The step that matters

Soften the mixture with milk until very soft. The mixture must be soft enough to shape but firm enough to hold its form. Too little moisture makes it crumbly, while too much makes it slump and burst during frying.

Swap the mustard

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

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

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