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Almond Croquettes

A fried almond-based mixture made with butter, milk, flour, and ground almonds.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and almond are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,673 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Almond Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the almond base

  1. Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat.

  2. Add the flour and stir until smooth.

  3. Gradually add the milk, stirring constantly until thickened.

  4. Stir in the ground and browned almonds.

Set and fry

  1. Let the mixture cool, then pour it onto a flat dish.

  2. Cut into squares and fry 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. Flour + almondtop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,673 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  3. Butter + almondtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,245 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-pentanedione (butter, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Butter
Adds richness and fat, carrying flavour and helping the flour form a smooth paste.
Flour
Thickens the milk with the butter, giving the mixture the body that lets it set firm.
Milk
Supplies the liquid that the flour's starch swells in, forming a thick, creamy base.
Almonds
Provide nutty flavour and a slightly grainy texture through the set mixture.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool fully before cutting. As the thickened mixture cools, its starch network firms up and sets. If it is cut or fried while still warm and soft, the squares will lose their shape and may break apart in the fat.

“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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