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Parsnip Croquettes

A fried ball of mashed parsnips mixed with butter, milk, egg, and spices, coated in cracker dust.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Parsnip Croquettes

Why it works: Parsnip and walnut share more aroma than cooks usually use. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 22 recipes. Both carry sabinene, which smells woody, terpenic. The science ↓

Parsnip Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Boil the parsnips until soft, then mash until fine.

  2. Combine the mashed parsnips with salt, melted butter, pepper, and milk in a pot.

  3. Mix the mixture well over heat until hot.

  4. Remove from heat and stir in the beaten egg.

  5. Spread the mixture on a dish to cool.

Shape and fry

  1. Take a nut and roll the parsnip mixture around it to form a ball.

  2. Coat the balls in egg and cracker dust.

  3. Fry the balls in plenty of butter until light brown.

  4. Serve the croquettes 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. Parsnip + walnuttop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together22 recipes

    Shared aroma: sabinene (woody, terpenic).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Parsnip + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,109 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + walnuttop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,039 recipes

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

  5. Butter + walnuttop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,832 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Parsnips
Form the main body of the croquettes, giving them their flavor and soft interior.
Egg
Binds the mashed mixture so it holds its shape, and the coating egg helps crumbs adhere.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture, and browns during frying for a golden crust.
Milk
Adds moisture and softness to the mashed parsnips.

The step that matters

Cooling the mixture before shaping. The mixture must cool enough to handle, otherwise it stays soft and sticky and the balls can fall apart when coated and fried.

Swap the parsnip

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Potatofits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Parsnipthe original

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