Why it works: Milk and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓
Plain Fritters
Ingredients
Directions
Make the batter
Combine milk, eggs, baking soda, cream of tartar, and salt in a bowl.
Fry
Heat lard in a pan until hot.
Drop spoonfuls of the batter into the hot lard.
Add a crust of bread to soak up the brown part of the lard.
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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Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together11,466 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).
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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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Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together29,399 recipes
Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
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Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together42,166 recipes
Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).
Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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
- Eggs
- Bind the batter and add structure and richness to the fritters.
- Baking soda
- Reacts with the cream of tartar to produce gas that lifts the batter.
- Cream of tartar
- Acidic partner to the baking soda, helping the batter rise and set.
- Sweet milk
- Provides the liquid that hydrates the batter and gives it tenderness.
The step that matters
Dropping the batter into hot lard. If the lard is not hot enough, the batter absorbs fat instead of setting quickly, leaving greasy, flat fritters. Hot fat seals the outside fast so the batter can puff and cook through.
“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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