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Meat and Potato Croquettes

A fried ball or roll made of meat and mashed potato mixed with butter, flour, milk, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Onion and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Meat and Potato Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. In a stew pan, melt the butter and sauté the minced onion until it simmers.

  2. Add the flour and stir until smooth and frothy.

  3. Gradually add the milk, seasoning with salt and pepper, and bring to a boil while stirring.

  4. Mix in the chopped meat and mashed potato thoroughly, then spread on a plate to cool.

Shape and fry

  1. Once cool enough, shape the mixture into balls or rolls.

  2. Dip each ball in the beaten egg, then roll in cracker or bread crumbs.

  3. Fry in hot lard for about 2 minutes until golden brown.

  4. Remove with a skimmer and drain on brown paper.

Serve

  1. Serve immediately while hot.

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. Onion + potatotop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  4. Milk + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,611 recipes

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

  5. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Butter
Enriches the flavor and forms the fat base for cooking the onion and flour.
Flour
Thickens the milk into a smooth, binding white sauce that holds the mixture together.
Milk
Forms the liquid of the sauce, adding moisture and softness to the filling.
Mashed potato
Adds body and moisture to the filling so the croquettes hold their shape.
Beaten egg
Coats the shaped balls so the crumbs stick and help bind the surface.
Cracker or bread crumbs
Forms a crisp, golden coating during frying.

The step that matters

Cooling the mixture before shaping. If the filling is still hot, it is soft and sticky and will not hold its shape. Cooling firms the starches and fats so the balls keep their form through breading and frying.

Swap the onion

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, flour, milk, pepper, meat, potato, 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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