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Potato Fritters

A fried dish made from mashed potatoes mixed with milk, butter, egg, and seasonings, coated in crumbs or flour.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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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 ↓

Potato Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. In a bowl, beat together the hot mashed potatoes, hot milk, butter, egg, salt, and pepper until well mixed.

  2. Allow the mixture to cool completely.

  3. Cut the cooled mixture into squares.

Coat and fry

  1. Roll each square in egg, then coat with cracker crumbs or flour.

  2. Fry the fritters in deep boiling oil until golden brown.

  3. Serve hot and dry.

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. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  3. Potato + milktop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

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

Mashed potatoes
Form the bulk of the fritter and give a soft, tender interior.
Egg
Binds the mixture together and helps the coating adhere.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, improving flavor and softness inside.
Milk
Adds moisture and keeps the potato mixture smooth and pliable.
Cracker crumbs or flour
Forms a dry coating that browns and crisps during frying.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool completely before cutting. A warm, soft mixture is too loose to hold its shape. Cooling lets the starch set and the egg firm up, so the squares keep their form when rolled and fried.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Capsicumfits about as well
  2. Potatothe original
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Chivefits about as well

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