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Chicken Croquettes

Chicken croquettes made with chopped chicken, onion, butter, flour, broth, eggs, and seasonings, then breaded and fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Jacqueline Harrison Smith (ed.) · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 7 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 filling

  1. Chop a half good-sized chicken finely.

  2. Chop ½ onion finely.

  3. Fry the onion with 1 oz butter.

  4. Add ½ tablespoon flour and stir for half a minute.

  5. Add the chopped chicken, a little over a gill of broth, salt, pepper, and a pinch of nutmeg; stir for about 2 minutes.

  6. Remove from heat.

  7. Mix 2 yolks of eggs with the mixture, return to heat, and stir for one minute.

  8. Add chopped mushrooms, truffles, or both.

Shape and coat

  1. Make breadcrumbs from pastry crust.

  2. Shape the mixture into croquettes.

  3. Dip each croquette in beaten egg.

  4. Roll each croquette in breadcrumbs.

Fry

  1. Fry the croquettes.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

595Calories
21 gProtein
7 gFat
108 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 6 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Flour1 cup (125g) all-purpose455
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Nutmeg1 tsp ground (2.2g)12
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
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 Jacqueline Harrison Smith (ed.). 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. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  2. Flour + nutmegtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,623 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Onion + nutmegtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,371 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Chicken (in the method)
Forms the bulk of the filling and gives the croquettes their main flavour and body.
Flour
Thickens the butter and onion base so the filling holds together when shaped.
Broth
Moistens the chicken and loosens the flour base into a cohesive, spreadable mixture.
Eggs
Yolks enrich and bind the filling, helping it set firm when heated.

The step that matters

Mix 2 yolks of eggs with the mixture, return to heat, and stir for one minute.. Egg yolks set when heated, so the filling binds firmly. If the mixture is too hot when the yolks go in, or stirred too long, they can scramble and make it grainy, and the croquettes may then crack or fall apart during frying.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Arrowrootfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against flour, 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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