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Veal Croquettes

A fried roll of veal mixed with water, coated in flour, eggs, and crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 22,662 recipes. Both carry (e)-2-octenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Veal Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the veal

  1. Dredge pieces of cold veal with flour and season with coarse sea salt and black pepper.

  2. Chop the veal very fine and add enough warm water to bind it together.

  3. Form the mixture into cork-shaped rolls.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip the rolls into well-beaten eggs.

  2. Roll the coated rolls in cracker crumbs or fine bread crumbs.

  3. Fry in hot lard until golden brown.

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 + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

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

  4. Veal + breadtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,056 recipes

    Shared aroma: cis-3-hexenol (green, grassy).

  5. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Flour and egg barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Veal
Forms the main body of the croquette, giving it a meaty texture and savory flavor.
Flour
Dry coating on the veal that helps the surface stay dry and aid in browning.
Warm water
Moistens the chopped veal so it binds together and holds its cork shape.
Eggs
Create a sticky layer that helps the crumbs adhere to the rolls.
Cracker crumbs or fine bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden outer crust when fried.

The step that matters

Fry in hot lard until golden brown. If the lard is not hot enough, the coating absorbs fat and becomes greasy instead of crisp, and the interior may cook unevenly. Hot fat sets the crumb crust quickly and drives browning.

“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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