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Fish Croquettes

Fish croquettes are fried balls of flaked fish and mashed potatoes coated in crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Fish Croquettes

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 ↓

Fish Croquettes

Oven, in the book's wordsA hot oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Mix the fish with the mashed potatoes, then add the butter to the hot potatoes to melt.

  2. Stir in the hot milk, beaten egg, pepper, salt, and parsley until thoroughly combined.

  3. Set the mixture aside to cool.

Shape and coat

  1. Once cool, shape into balls.

  2. Dip each ball into the beaten egg, then roll in cracker crumbs or fine bread crumbs.

Fry and serve

  1. Just before serving, heat oil in a frying basket and plunge the croquettes in boiling fat.

  2. Cook for 2 minutes, drain well, and serve immediately.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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

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

  3. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

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

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

  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

Fish
Provides the main filling and flavor, bound into the potato mixture.
Mashed potatoes
Form the soft body of the croquette and help hold the shape together.
Egg
Binds the mixture and gives the outer coating something to stick to.
Butter
Adds richness and moisture to the mashed potato base.
Hot milk
Adds moisture and softness, keeping the mixture tender.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before shaping. A warm, soft mixture is too loose to hold its shape and can crack or fall apart in the hot fat. Cooling firms the starch and binders so the balls keep their form during frying.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Parsleythe original
  2. Nutmegfits about as well
  3. Thymefits less well
  4. Cinnamonfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, potato, butter, milk, egg, pepper, bread. 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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