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Eokce Meat Balls

Small fried balls of chopped meat, egg, and bread crumbs, moistened with water and seasoned with salt and red pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Eokce Meat Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a bowl, mix the chopped meat, egg, butter or raw pork, and bread crumbs.

  2. Moisten the mixture with warm water or water from stewed meat.

  3. Season with coarse sea salt and red pepper.

Cook

  1. Form the mixture into small balls.

  2. Fry the meatballs in a pan until they are browned.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  3. Bread + meattop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,924 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  4. Bread + peppertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

  5. Butter + meattop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chopped veal or other meat
Provides the main protein that forms the body of the meatball.
Egg
Binds the mixture so the meatballs hold together when formed and fried.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and help keep the meatballs tender rather than dense.
Butter or raw pork
Adds fat, which contributes moisture and richness to the meatballs.

The step that matters

Fry the meatballs until browned. Browning develops flavor through the Maillard reaction, and frying over steady heat cooks the centre through while keeping the outside seared rather than dry.

“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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