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Codfish Balls

Codfish balls are fried balls made from boiled codfish, mashed potatoes, eggs, butter, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,305 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Codfish Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Boil the codfish a day before and pick it fine.

Mix and rest

  1. In a bowl, mix the codfish with mashed potatoes (1 part fish to 2 parts potatoes).

  2. Add chopped hard-boiled eggs, drawn butter, and pepper to the mixture.

  3. Let the mixture sit overnight.

Fry

  1. Form the mixture into balls and fry them in lard 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. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  2. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

  3. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Butter + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  5. Potato + eggtop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,978 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Codfish
Provides the savory flavor and the main body of the balls.
Mashed potatoes
Bind the fish together and add moisture and soft body to the balls.
Hard-boiled eggs
Add richness and help bind the mixture into a firm, cohesive texture.
Drawn butter
Adds fat for richness and moisture, keeping the mixture tender.
Lard
Fries the outside, driving browning and a crisp golden crust.

The step that matters

Frying in lard until golden brown. Frying at a steady, adequate heat browns the surface quickly while the interior heats through. Too low a temperature lets the balls absorb grease and turn soggy; too high browns the outside before the centre is hot.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Asparagusfits about as well
  3. Chivefits about as well
  4. Potatothe original

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