Skip to main content
Main

Salsify Fritters

A fried batter of mashed salsify, eggs, milk, butter, and flour seasoned with pepper and salt.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Salsify Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salsify

  1. Scrape the salsify and soak it in water to prevent browning.

  2. Boil the salsify until tender, then mash it finely.

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, beat the egg yolks and whites separately until light.

  2. Mix the beaten egg yolks with milk and melted butter.

  3. Gradually add flour to achieve a fritter batter consistency.

  4. Fold in the mashed salsify and season with pepper and salt.

Fry

  1. Heat oil in a pan and fry spoonfuls of the batter 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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Salsify
Forms the bulk of the fritters and gives them their main flavour and body once mashed.
Eggs
Yolks enrich the batter and whites, beaten separately, lighten it and help the fritters rise and set.
Milk
Moistens the batter so the flour hydrates into a smooth, pourable mixture.
Flour
Provides structure, thickening the batter so it holds its shape in the pan.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, contributing flavour and helping the fritters brown.

The step that matters

Soak the salsify after scraping. Salsify discolours quickly when its cut surfaces meet air. Soaking it in water slows browning, which keeps the mashed salsify pale and the fritters looking clean.

“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.

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesYorkshire PuddingYorkshire Pudding264 recipes