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Nut and Potato Croquettes

A fried croquette made with walnuts, mashed potatoes, eggs, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Walnut and potato match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 342 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Nut and Potato Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Chop walnut meats coarsely.

  2. Mix chopped walnuts with mashed potatoes and season to taste.

  3. Stir in soft bread crumbs and well-beaten eggs.

  4. Mould the mixture into croquettes.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip each croquette in beaten egg, then roll in fine bread crumbs.

  2. Fry in deep hot fat 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. Walnut + potatotop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together342 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Walnut + meattop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,035 recipes

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

  3. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

  4. Meat + potatotop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together786 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Meat + breadtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 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

Black walnut meats
Provide the nutty flavour and body of the croquette filling.
Mashed potatoes
Bind the filling and add moisture and a soft, tender interior.
Eggs
Bind the mixture together and set during frying to hold the shape.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture in the filling and form a crisp, browned outer crust when fried.

The step that matters

Fry in deep hot fat until golden brown. If the fat is not hot enough, the coating absorbs oil and becomes greasy before it crisps, and the egg may not set properly. Frying at a steady hot temperature seals the crumb crust quickly and keeps the inside moist.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Lettucefits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against walnut, meat, egg, bread. 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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