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Beef Rissoles

Beef rissoles are small beef balls coated in pastry or breadcrumbs, fried and served over mashed potatoes.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 13,015 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Beef Rissoles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a bowl, combine the finely chopped beef, herbs, bread crumbs, pepper, salt, nutmeg, and egg.

  2. Mix until well combined and form into small balls.

Coat and cook

  1. If using puff pastry, wrap the balls in it.

  2. If using bread crumbs, roll the balls in the crumbs.

  3. Fry the rissoles until golden brown.

Serve

  1. Serve the rissoles on a bed of mashed potatoes.

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. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  2. Beef + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,052 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Nutmeg + potatotop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,052 recipes

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

  4. Pepper + potatotop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  5. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 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

Lean cooked beef
Forms the main body of the rissoles and gives them their savoury flavour.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and help bind the mixture so the rissoles hold their shape.
Egg
Binds the mixture together and helps it set when cooked.

Swap the potato

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (beef, bread, pepper, nutmeg, egg):

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

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, bread, pepper, nutmeg, egg. 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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