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Fresh Fish Balls

A dish of boiled fish and mashed potato formed into balls, coated in egg and breadcrumbs, then fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley 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 ↓

Fresh Fish Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a bowl, combine the cold boiled fish and mashed potato.

  2. Add salt, black pepper, egg yolk, onion juice, and chopped parsley; mix well.

  3. Form the mixture into balls.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip each ball in the beaten egg mixture, then roll in breadcrumbs.

  2. Fry the balls in hot oil until golden brown.

Serve

  1. Serve with tomato sauce.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Potato + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

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

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

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

  4. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

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

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Cold boiled fish
Provides the main body and flavour of the balls.
Mashed potato
Adds bulk and softness, and helps the mixture hold together when shaped.
Egg yolk
Binds the mixture and adds richness to hold the balls together.
Beaten egg
Forms a coating that helps breadcrumbs stick and promotes even browning.

The step that matters

Fry in hot oil until golden brown. If the oil is not hot enough, the breadcrumb coating absorbs oil and turns greasy instead of crisping. Hot oil seals the crust quickly, so the balls brown evenly and stay less oily inside.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (fish, potato, pepper, egg, parsley):

  1. Carrotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Capsicumfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, potato, pepper, egg, parsley. 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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