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To Dress Egg Plant

A fried eggplant mash made with butter, eggs, flour, and lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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To Dress Egg Plant

Why it works: Eggplant and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,123 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

To Dress Egg Plant

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggplant

  1. Boil the eggplants in salted water until tender.

  2. Remove the skin and scoop out the insides.

Make the mixture

  1. Mash the insides finely and mix in the butter, beaten eggs, flour, salt, and pepper.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat the lard in a pan until boiling.

  2. Drop spoonfuls of the mixture into the lard 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.

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. Eggplant + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,123 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Eggplant + flourtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together371 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

Eggplants
Form the soft, creamy body of the mash once boiled and mashed.
Eggs
Bind the mash so the spoonfuls hold their shape while frying.
Flour
Helps thicken the mixture and supports binding with the eggs.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the mashed eggplant.
Lard
Conducts heat for frying and browns the outside of each spoonful.

The step that matters

Frying the spoonfuls in boiling lard. The lard must be hot enough before the mixture goes in. Hot fat sets the outside quickly and browns it, so the spoonfuls stay less greasy and hold their shape. Adding them to cooler fat lets the mash soak up oil and fall apart.

Swap the eggplant

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

  1. Chivefits better
  2. Shallotfits better
  3. Asparagusfits better
  4. Eggplantthe original

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