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Rissoles, Rice

Rice rissoles are fried patties made from cooked rice mixed with eggs, sauce, spices, and savory mince.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,015 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Rissoles, Rice

Ingredients

Directions

Make the rice base

  1. Boil the rice until soft and dry.

  2. Beat the rice well.

  3. Mix in the beaten eggs, white sauce, pepper, salt, and nutmeg.

  4. Cook the mixture over low heat until the eggs are set.

  5. Transfer the mixture to a dish to cool.

Shape and coat

  1. Once cool, mold a spoonful of the mixture in a tea cup to form a hollow round shape.

  2. Fill the center with savory mince.

  3. Cover with more rice.

  4. Dip the rissoles in egg.

  5. Coat with bread crumbs.

Fry and serve

  1. Fry in hot fat until lightly browned, about 5-6 minutes.

  2. Drain the rissoles.

  3. Serve hot on a napkin.

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 + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Rice + nutmegtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Rice + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,379 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Rice + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,259 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

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

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

What each ingredient does

Rice
Forms the main body of the rissole and, once boiled and beaten, binds into a firm mass.
Eggs
Set during cooking to hold the rice mixture together and bind the shape.
White sauce
Adds moisture and softness to the rice mixture so it stays tender rather than dry.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden browned outer coating when fried.

The step that matters

Cook the mixture until the eggs are set. Eggs only bind when heated enough to coagulate. If the mixture is undercooked it stays wet and will fall apart when shaped and fried; cooking over low heat avoids scrambling or drying it out.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, egg, sauce, pepper, bread):

  1. Parsleyfits about as well
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Turmericfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, egg, sauce, pepper, bread. 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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