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Salt Pork in Batter

Salt pork pieces coated in a batter of milk, egg, flour, and seasonings, then fried until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pork and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,386 recipes. Both carry 4-heptenal, which smells creamy, biscuit. The science ↓

Salt Pork in Batter

Oven, in the book's wordsA moderate oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the pork

  1. Slice the salt pork into ¼ inch thick pieces and remove the rind.

  2. Pour boiling water over the pork and let it stand for 5 minutes.

  3. Drain the water and fry the pork until cooked on both sides.

Batter and fry

  1. In a bowl, mix the milk, beaten egg, salt, cream of tartar, baking soda, and flour to make a batter.

  2. Dip the cooked pork pieces into the batter.

  3. Fry the battered pork in hot pork fat 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. Pork + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,386 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Pork + creamtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,093 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-one (mushroom, metallic).

  5. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Salt pork
Provides the savory meat and fat that the batter coats and fries.
Egg
Binds the batter and helps it set firm and cohesive as it cooks.
Flour
Forms the base of the batter, giving it body and a crisp, golden coating.
Milk
Hydrates the flour and gives the batter a tender, smooth consistency.
Baking soda
Reacts with the cream of tartar to lighten the batter and aid browning.
Cream of tartar
Acidifies the batter, working with baking soda to produce lift and a lighter texture.

The step that matters

Fry the battered pork in hot pork fat until golden brown. If the fat is not hot enough, the batter absorbs oil and turns greasy and soggy before it sets. Hot fat sets the coating quickly, creating a crisp, browned crust.

“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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