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Lentil Cutlets

Lentil cutlets are breaded patties made from cooked lentils, onions, thyme, and breadcrumbs, then fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Lentils and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 6% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 137 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Lentil Cutlets

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Soak and cook the lentils until tender.

  2. Mix the cooked lentils with grated onions, thyme, and enough bread crumbs to form a stiff mixture.

  3. Shape the mixture into cutlets.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip each cutlet in beaten egg, then coat with additional bread crumbs.

  2. Fry the cutlets in hot oil until golden brown.

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.

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. Lentils + thymetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together137 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Onion + thymetop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,171 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  3. Lentils + oniontop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,221 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

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

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

  5. Onion + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,676 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Lentils
Provide the main body and protein-rich bulk that holds the cutlet together.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and bind the mixture into a stiff shape, and form a crisp coating.
Egg
Binds the crumb coating to the cutlet so it sticks during frying.
Grated onions
Add moisture and sweetness that keep the cutlets tender inside.

The step that matters

Fry the cutlets in hot oil until golden brown. If the oil is not hot enough, the coating absorbs oil and turns greasy before it browns, and the cutlets may fall apart. Good heat sets the crumb crust quickly and browns it through the Maillard reaction.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (lentils, thyme, bread, egg):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against lentils, thyme, 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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