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Codfish Croquettes

A fried croquette made from mashed potatoes, codfish, eggs, and cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Wash the potatoes and place them in boiling water.

  2. Boil until the potatoes are done, then drain and mash finely.

Shape the croquettes

  1. Mix in the beaten eggs, thick cream, and salt if needed.

  2. Let the mixture cool, then shape it into croquettes.

Fry and serve

  1. Fry the croquettes in hot butter until golden brown.

  2. Serve warm.

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).

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Egg + creamtop 24% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together42,166 recipes

    Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Egg and cream barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 42,166 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

Potatoes
Form the starchy bulk of the mixture that holds the croquettes together.
Codfish
Provides the main flavour and savoury character of the croquettes.
Eggs
Bind the mixture so the croquettes hold their shape when cooked.
Thick cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the interior soft rather than dry.
Butter
Fat for frying that helps the outside brown and turn golden.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before shaping. Warm mash is soft and sticky, so it is hard to shape and may fall apart. Cooling firms the starch and eggs, letting the croquettes hold their form in the hot fat.

Swap the potato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, 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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