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Brain Fritters

Brain fritters are small fried balls made from mashed brains, egg, milk, flour, salt, and pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Brain Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the brains

  1. Wash the brains and remove any fiber and skin.

  2. Drop the brains into boiling water and cook gently for 15 minutes.

  3. Transfer the brains to ice-cold water until stiff and white.

Make the batter

  1. Wipe and mash the brains into a batter with a wooden spoon, seasoning with salt and pepper.

  2. Beat in the egg, milk, and prepared flour.

Fry and serve

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the mixture into boiling fat and fry quickly.

  2. Shake in a heated colander to remove excess fat and serve very 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.

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. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + milktop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Brains
Form the main body of the fritters, giving them a soft, creamy interior.
Egg
Binds the mixture together and helps the fritters hold their shape while frying.
Prepared flour
Thickens the batter so it holds together when dropped into the fat.
Milk
Loosens the mashed mixture into a spoonable batter and adds moisture.

The step that matters

Fry quickly in boiling fat. The fat must be fully hot so the outside sets and browns quickly. If the fat is too cool, the spoonfuls absorb grease and turn heavy and oily instead of crisp.

“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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