Skip to main content
Main

Potato Balls

A fried ball made of mashed potatoes, ham, cream, egg, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓
Potato Balls

Why it works: Parsley and pepper match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Potato Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mixture

  1. In a bowl, mix together the mashed potatoes, chopped ham, cream, egg, melted butter, salt, parsley, and pepper.

  2. Form the mixture into balls.

  3. Roll the balls in flour.

Fry

  1. In a skillet, heat equal parts lard and butter over medium heat.

  2. Fry the balls 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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Mashed potatoes
Provide the bulk and body that hold the balls together.
Egg
Binds the mixture so the balls keep their shape while frying.
Cream
Adds moisture and softness to the mixture.
Chopped boiled ham
Adds savory flavor and salty depth to the balls.
Flour
Forms a dry coating that helps the outside brown well in the pan.

The step that matters

Fry the balls until golden brown. Frying over medium heat lets the outside brown through the Maillard reaction while the inside heats gently. Too high a heat can scorch the flour coating before the center is hot, and too low a heat leaves the balls greasy and pale.

Swap the potato

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

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

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

More potato balls recipes

Fried 12Sweet 9English 7Baked 6Oyster 4Ragout 4 See all 126 →

You might also like

Potato CroquettesPotato Croquettes255 recipesPotato RollsPotato Rolls78 recipesPotato ChipsPotato Chips53 recipesSweet Potato CroquettesSweet Potato Croquettes53 recipes