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Fritters Made of Biscuit Dough

Fritters made from biscuit dough filled with jam, fried, and served with lemon sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Mary Ronald · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 10 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 ↓

Fritters Made of Biscuit Dough

Ingredients

Directions

Make the biscuit dough

  1. Make a biscuit dough as given on page 352.

  2. Turn the dough on a floured board and let it rise until light.

  3. Roll the dough one eighth of an inch thick and cut it into circles with a fluted patty-cutter.

  4. Put a teaspoonful of jam in the center of a circle.

  5. Wet the edges and cover with a second circle; press the edges lightly together.

  6. Fry in hot fat.

Make the choux batter

  1. Put a cupful of water in a saucepan.

  2. When it boils add one tablespoonful of butter.

  3. When the butter is melted add one cupful of flour and beat it with a fork or wire whip until it is smooth and leaves the sides of the pan.

  4. Remove from the fire.

  5. Add three eggs, one at a time, beating vigorously each one before adding the next.

  6. Let it stand until cold.

Fry and serve

  1. When ready to serve, drop a spoonful at a time into moderately hot fat and fry for about 15 minutes.

  2. Take out on a skimmer and dry on brown paper.

  3. The batter will puff into hollow balls.

  4. If the fat is very hot it will crisp the outside too soon and prevent the balls from puffing.

  5. Fry only a few at a time, as they must be kept separated.

  6. Sprinkle with powdered sugar and pile on a folded napkin.

  7. Serve with lemon sauce made as follows.

  8. Strain the juice of one and a half lemons.

  9. Add one cupful of powdered sugar.

  10. Add a half cupful of boiling water.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

696Calories
20 gProtein
18 gFat
112 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 6 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Butter1 tbsp (14g)102
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Waternot in our table0

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

By Mary Ronald. 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.

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. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  5. Flour + lemontop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30,404 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

Eggs
Beaten into the cooked paste to give it structure and let it puff when fried.
Flour
Cooked with the butter and water to form a smooth paste that holds the batter together.
Butter
Melted into the boiling water to add richness and fat to the paste.
Powdered sugar
Sprinkled on the finished fritters for sweetness.

The step that matters

Keep the fat at moderate heat and fry only a few at a time. If the fat is too hot the outside sets and browns before the batter can expand, so the balls stay dense instead of puffing. Crowding the pan drops the fat temperature and makes them stick together.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, flour, sugar, egg):

  1. Raisinfits better
  2. Vanillafits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, sugar, 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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