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Fish Croquettes

Fish croquettes made from flaked halibut or salmon mixed with white sauce, seasoned, breaded, fried, and garnished with parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Fish Croquettes

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Fish Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. Combine cold flaked halibut or salmon with thick white sauce in a bowl.

  2. Season the mixture with salt and pepper.

  3. Spread the mixture on a plate and let it cool.

Shape and coat

  1. Shape the mixture into croquettes.

  2. Roll the croquettes in bread crumbs, dip them in beaten egg, then roll them in bread crumbs again.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat oil in a deep pan.

  2. Fry the croquettes until golden brown.

  3. Drain the croquettes on paper towels.

  4. Arrange them on a hot dish and garnish with parsley.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Bread + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,588 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Salmon + eggtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,485 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Halibut or salmon
Forms the main body of the croquette and gives its flavour.
Thick white sauce
Binds the flaked fish so the mixture holds its shape when shaped.
Egg
Coats the croquettes so the bread crumbs stick and form a crisp shell.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden outer crust when fried.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before shaping. A warm, loose mixture is soft and sticky, so the croquettes can slump or split. Cooling firms the starch in the white sauce so the shapes hold during coating and frying.

Swap the parsley

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (salmon, sauce, pepper, bread, egg):

  1. Capersfits about as well
  2. Parsleythe original
  3. Nutmegfits about as well
  4. Tarragonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against salmon, sauce, pepper, bread, 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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