Why it works: Bread and egg are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 22,662 recipes. Both carry (e)-2-octenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓
Croquettes
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the mixture
Pound the meat to a paste in a mortar.
Mix in fine bread crumbs, flour, and condiments.
Incorporate the eggs into the mixture.
Shape and coat
Shape the mixture into desired forms, preferably sausages.
Coat the shaped croquettes in egg and bread crumbs.
Let them rest for 30 minutes.
Fry and serve
Fry in lard until lightly colored and serve.
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.
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Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Meat + breadtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together2,924 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together106,462 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Meat + eggtop 22% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,432 recipes
Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).
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Bread + flourtop 25% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together10,383 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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
- Meat
- Provides the main body and savory flavor of the croquettes.
- Eggs
- Bind the mixture and help the coating set during frying.
- Fine bread crumbs
- Absorb moisture and give the mixture body, plus a crisp outer coating.
- Flour
- Helps bind the mixture and absorb moisture from the meat.
- Lard
- Conducts heat for frying and promotes browning of the outside.
The step that matters
Fry until lightly colored. Frying at a steady heat sets the egg and crumb coating into a crisp shell while the interior heats through. Too hot and the outside darkens before the center is warm; too cool and the coating absorbs excess fat and turns greasy.
“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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