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To Make Croquets

A fried patty made from minced meat, ham, fat, stale bread, salt, pepper, nutmeg, mustard, ketchup, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mary Randolph · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 4 ingredients
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To Make Croquets

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 ↓

To Make Croquets

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Take cold fowl or fresh meat of any kind, with slices of ham, fat and lean, and chop them together very fine.

  2. Add half as much stale bread grated, salt, pepper, grated nutmeg, a teaspoonful of mustard, a tablespoonful of ketchup, and a lump of butter.

  3. Knead all well together until it resembles sausage meat.

Shape and fry

  1. Shape the mixture into cakes.

  2. Dip the cakes in the yolk of a beaten egg.

  3. Cover them thickly with grated bread.

  4. Fry them until a light brown.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

21Calories
0 gProtein
1 gFat
3 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 4 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
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 Mary Randolph. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Nutmeg + mustardtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,019 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  3. Pepper + mustardtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,430 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

Stale bread (in the method)
Grated bread absorbs moisture and binds the meat into a shapeable mixture.
Butter (in the method)
Fat adds richness and moisture to the meat mixture.
Egg yolk (in the method)
Coats the cakes so the grated bread crust adheres and helps them brown.
Mustard
Adds a sharp, savoury flavour that balances the rich meat.

The step that matters

Fry them until a light brown. Frying over heat that is too high browns the outside before the inside is heated through, while low heat leaves the crumb coating greasy and pale. Watching the colour keeps the centre hot and the crust crisp.

Swap the mustard

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against 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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