Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓
Rice Croquettes
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
In a bowl, combine cold boiled rice, eggs, sugar, and lemon peel.
Form the mixture into oval balls.
Roll each ball in bread crumbs, then dip in beaten egg.
Fry and serve
Heat butter in a pan and fry the croquettes until golden brown.
Remove from the pan and sprinkle with sugar before serving.
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.
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Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together27,232 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Rice + lemontop 12% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together4,366 recipes
Shared aroma: (e,e)-2,4-decadienal (fatty, deep fried).
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Rice + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together1,259 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).
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Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together22,662 recipes
Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).
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Rice + buttertop 16% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,645 recipes
Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Cold boiled rice
- Forms the bulk of the croquette, giving it body that holds its shape.
- Eggs
- Bind the mixture together and form a coating that helps the crumbs stick.
- Bread crumbs
- Create a crisp outer crust that browns when fried.
- Sugar
- Adds sweetness that complements the lemon and helps the exterior brown.
The step that matters
Frying the croquettes. Fry over moderate heat until golden brown. Too high a heat browns the crumbs before the centre heats through, while too low a heat lets the croquettes absorb excess butter and turn greasy.
Swap the lemon
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, egg, sugar, bread, butter):
- Vanillafits better
- Coconutfits better
- Figfits about as well
- Lemonthe original
Fit is the average pairing score against rice, egg, sugar, bread, butter. 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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