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Rissoles in Paste

A pastry-wrapped meat filling cooked in a panada, then fried and served with fried parsley.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 68,474 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Rissoles in Paste

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Melt the butter in a pan.

  2. Stir in the flour and stock to make a panada.

  3. Add the chopped meat, onion, and seasonings. Mix well and spread on a plate to cool.

Shape the rissoles

  1. Roll out the pastry very thinly.

  2. Place 1 teaspoon of the mixture at regular intervals on the pastry. Wet the edges of the pastry. Fold over the pastry. Seal the pastry securely.

  3. Cut out half-moon shapes.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip the shapes in beaten egg. Coat with breadcrumbs.

  2. Fry in hot oil until golden brown.

  3. Garnish with fried parsley and serve.

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. Pepper + oniontop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + oniontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together42,912 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Meat + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Short pastry
Forms the thin golden case that encloses the filling and becomes crisp when fried.
Butter
Enriches the panada and adds richness and flavour to the filling.
Flour
Thickens the stock into a panada, giving the filling a binding, spreadable body.
Cooked meat
Provides the main savoury filling, bound together by the panada.
Egg
Coats the shapes so the breadcrumbs adhere and brown evenly when fried.
Breadcrumbs
Form a crisp, browned outer crust when fried.

The step that matters

Seal the pastry securely. If the edges are not wetted and firmly sealed, the filling can leak out into the hot oil and the rissoles may open while frying.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Asparagusfits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

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