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Egg Plant

A fried batter of mashed eggplant, eggs, milk, and flour, served hot.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Egg Plant

Why it works: Eggplant and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,123 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Egg Plant

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggplant

  1. Peel and cut the eggplant into pieces.

  2. Boil in salted water until soft.

  3. Mash the eggplant and pass it through a colander.

Make the batter

  1. Add beaten eggs, milk, and enough flour to make a batter.

  2. Season with salt and pepper.

Fry and serve

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the mixture into hot lard and fry until golden brown.

  2. Serve very hot.

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.

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. Eggplant + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Eggplant + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together371 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Eggplant
Forms the soft, moist body of the fritter mixture.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help set the fritters as they cook.
Flour
Thickens the mashed eggplant into a batter that holds its shape.
Milk
Loosens the batter and adds moisture for a tender interior.
Lard
Fries the fritters, promoting browning and a crisp exterior.

The step that matters

Drop spoonfuls into hot lard and fry until golden brown. If the lard is not hot enough, the batter absorbs fat and turns greasy instead of crisping. Frying at a steady high heat sets the outside quickly and browns it through the Maillard reaction.

Swap the eggplant

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Spinachfits better
  4. Eggplantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, milk, flour, pepper. 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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