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Dessert

Drop Fritters

Drop fritters are batter‑coated pieces fried until golden, served hot with powdered sugar and maple syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Drop Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a bowl, combine milk, salt, and melted butter.

  2. Add flour and mix until smooth.

  3. Fold in the beaten egg whites gently.

Fry and serve

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the batter into hot fat.

  2. Cook until browned on both sides.

  3. Drain on paper towels, sprinkle with powdered sugar, and serve hot with maple syrup.

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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  5. Sugar + maple syruptop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,252 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

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

Milk
Provides the liquid that hydrates the flour and forms the batter.
Flour
Provides structure as its starches and proteins set during frying.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a tender texture.

The step that matters

Drop spoonfuls of the batter into hot fat. Hot fat sets the outside of each fritter quickly, so it browns and absorbs less grease. Cool fat lets the batter soak up oil and turn heavy. Spoon the batter in gently and avoid crowding so the fat stays hot.

“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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