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Salsify, or Oyster Plant

Salsify cakes made from boiled salsify, eggs, butter, flour, and fried in lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Salsify, or Oyster Plant

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the salsify

  1. Scrape the salsify roots and place them in cold water to prevent darkening.

  2. Cut the roots into 1‑inch pieces and place them in a saucepan with enough hot water to cover.

  3. Stew until tender, then drain the water and mash the salsify.

Make and fry the cakes

  1. In a bowl, mix the mashed salsify with 2 eggs, ¼ teaspoon salt, butter, and enough flour to create a thick batter.

  2. Form small cakes from the mixture and fry them in hot lard.

  3. Serve on a hot dish.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + buttertop 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

Salsify roots
Provide the main bulk and mild, earthy flavour of the cakes.
Eggs
Bind the mashed salsify so the cakes hold their shape while frying.
Flour
Thickens the mixture into a batter that can be formed into cakes.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, contributing flavour and a tender texture.
Lard
Fries the cakes in hot fat, browning the outside and crisping the surface.

The step that matters

Frying the cakes in hot lard. If the lard is not hot enough, the cakes absorb excess fat and turn greasy and pale instead of browning. Hot fat sears the surface quickly, forming a crust that helps the cakes hold together.

“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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