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Hominy Fritters

A fried batter of hominy, eggs, flour, and baking powder.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Flour and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Hominy Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine the hot boiled hominy, eggs, salt, and flour.

  2. Thin the mixture with a little cold milk.

  3. Once cool, add baking powder and mix thoroughly.

Fry

  1. Drop tablespoons of the mixture into hot fat and fry until golden brown.

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. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Hominy
Forms the bulk of the fritter, giving body and a soft, starchy interior.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and set when fried, holding the fritter together.
Flour
Adds starch that helps the batter hold its shape while frying.
Baking powder
Releases gas to lift the fritter and make it lighter.
Cold milk
Thins the mixture to a droppable consistency and adds moisture.

The step that matters

Add the baking powder after the mixture cools. Baking powder releases gas when it reacts with moisture and heat. Adding it to a hot mixture lets much of that lift escape before frying, so the fritters may come out denser.

“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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