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Mock Oyster Fritters

A fritter made from grated salsify, eggs, milk, flour, pepper, and sea salt, fried until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Mock Oyster Fritters

Why it works: Milk and flour 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 ↓

Mock Oyster Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Wash and grate the salsify roots.

  2. Season the grated salsify with pepper and coarse sea salt.

  3. Beat the yolks of the eggs until light. Stir the beaten yolks into the milk.

  4. Add enough flour to the milk mixture to create a batter.

  5. Whisk the egg whites until stiff. Fold the stiff egg whites into the batter along with the grated salsify.

Fry

  1. Spoon portions of the batter.

  2. Fry the portions until golden.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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 + flourtop 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).

  4. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + milktop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

Milk and flour 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

Roots of salsify
Provides the main body and oyster-like flavour of the fritters.
Eggs
Yolks enrich the batter, while whipped whites lighten it and help it set.
Milk
Moistens the batter and helps it brown as it fries.
Flour
Thickens the liquid into a batter that holds the fritters together.

The step that matters

Folding in the egg whites. Folding gently keeps the whipped whites' air in the batter, so the fritters stay light instead of turning dense and flat.

“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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