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Fish Balls

A savory dish of mashed potatoes mixed with shredded codfish, egg, cream, and pepper, then fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Cream and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 41,516 recipes. Both carry delta-dodecalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Fish Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Boil the potatoes until tender, then mash them.

  2. Pour boiling water over the shredded codfish and let it stand until soft.

Mix and fry

  1. Combine the softened codfish with the mashed potatoes, using half as much fish as potatoes.

  2. Add the beaten egg, cream, and pepper to the mixture and mix well.

  3. Fry the mixture in a skillet with butter or salt pork before the potatoes cool.

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. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  2. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  3. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

  4. Potato + creamtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together2,481 recipes

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

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Provide the bulk and starch that hold the mixture together and give it a soft, tender body.
Codfish
Adds the main salty, savory flavor and the fish texture that defines the dish.
Egg
Binds the mashed potato and fish so the mixture holds its shape when fried.
Cream
Adds moisture and richness, keeping the mixture soft rather than dry.

The step that matters

Fry before the potatoes cool. Mashed potato stiffens and becomes hard to shape as it cools, and the mixture needs to go into the hot skillet while still warm so it forms a crisp, browned outside and stays tender inside.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, cream, pepper, butter):

  1. Potatothe original
  2. Spinachfits about as well
  3. Asparagusfits about as well
  4. Capsicumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, cream, pepper, butter. 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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