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Mock Oyster Fritters

A batter of grated salsify, eggs, milk, and flour is fried into golden fritters.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Mock Oyster Fritters

Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Mock Oyster Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Wash and grate the salsify roots, then season with pepper and salt.

  2. Beat the yolks of the eggs until light, then stir into the milk.

  3. Add enough flour to the milk mixture to create a batter.

  4. Whisk the egg whites until stiff, then gradually fold them into the batter along with the salsify.

Fry

  1. Heat oil in a pan and drop spoonfuls of the batter into the hot oil, frying 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.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + flourtop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + milktop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

Salsify
Provides the main body and mild oyster-like flavour of the fritters.
Eggs
Yolks enrich the batter, while whipped whites lighten it and help it rise.
Milk
Thins the batter to a pourable consistency and adds richness and browning.
Flour
Gives the batter structure so the fritters hold together when fried.

The step that matters

Folding in the whipped egg whites. Whites beaten until stiff trap air that lightens the batter. Stirring them in vigorously knocks that air out, so the fritters turn out dense rather than light.

“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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