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French Fritters

A batter of milk, eggs, salt, baking powder, sugar, and corn flour fried in lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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French Fritters

Why it works: Milk and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,955 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓

French Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine milk, eggs, salt, baking powder, and sugar.

  2. Add corn flour gradually until a batter forms.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat lard in a frying pan.

  2. Drop spoonfuls of batter into the hot lard.

  3. Fry until golden brown, then turn to brown the other side.

  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.

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 + corntop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

  2. Corn + flourtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,165 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Eggs
Bind the batter and add structure as they set in the hot lard.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the fritters puff and turn light.
Corn flour
Forms the body of the batter, setting into a crisp golden crust when fried.
Milk
Provides the liquid that hydrates the flour and gives the batter its moisture.
Sugar
Sweetens the fritters and helps the outside brown in the pan.

The step that matters

Fry until golden brown, then turn to brown the other side.. The lard must be hot before the batter goes in; if it is too cool, the fritters absorb grease and turn soggy instead of crisping. Turning once lets both sides brown evenly and cook through.

“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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