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To Saute Salsify

Salsify cakes made by mashing boiled salsify, mixing with egg, coating with breadcrumbs, and frying.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 17% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 118,967 recipes. Both carry decanal, which smells soap, orange peel. The science ↓

To Saute Salsify

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salsify

  1. Cook the salsify in salted boiling water until tender.

  2. Drain and dry the salsify.

  3. Mash the salsify.

  4. Once slightly cooled, mix in the beaten egg and season with salt and pepper.

  5. Form the mixture into cakes.

Fry and serve

  1. Coat the cakes with egg and breadcrumbs.

  2. Heat clarified butter or drippings in a skillet.

  3. Brown the cakes on both sides.

  4. Serve hot.

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. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  2. Pepper + buttertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together85,593 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  3. Egg + peppertop 33% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together50,580 recipes

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

Egg and pepper barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 50,580 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

Salsify
Forms the main body of the cakes, providing bulk and a mild, starchy texture.
Egg
Binds the mashed salsify so the cakes hold their shape while frying.

The step that matters

Drain and dry the salsify. Excess water in mashed vegetables makes the mixture soft and loose, so the cakes may fall apart or steam instead of browning in the pan. Drying well helps them hold together and brown.

“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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