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Codfish Balls

Codfish balls are fried patties made from mashed potatoes and codfish, bound with cream or milk and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Codfish Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Mix the chopped codfish and mashed potatoes thoroughly.

  2. Add cream or milk and butter, mixing well.

Shape and fry

  1. Roll the mixture into small, flat balls about ½ inch thick.

  2. Fry the balls in hot lard 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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  3. Potato + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,481 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

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

What each ingredient does

Codfish
Provides the main savory flavor and the characteristic flaky texture of the balls.
Mashed potatoes
Binds the fish together and gives the balls a soft, tender interior.
Cream or milk
Adds moisture and softness to the mixture, keeping it easy to shape.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, improving flavor and tenderness.
Lard
Frying fat that browns the outside and gives a crisp, golden crust.

The step that matters

Fry the balls in hot lard until golden brown. If the lard is not hot enough, the balls absorb excess fat and turn greasy before a crust forms. Enough heat sears the surface quickly, so the browning and crispness develop while the inside warms through.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Potatothe original
  2. Onionfits about as well
  3. Leekfits less well
  4. Chivefits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, butter. 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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