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Pork Chops

Pork chops fried in lard and butter, served with a flour‑based gravy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Pork Chops

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the chops

  1. Pound the pork chops slightly.

  2. Dip each chop in the beaten egg, then coat with cracker crumbs, seasoning both the egg and crumbs.

Fry the chops

  1. Heat lard in a skillet and add a lump of butter to each chop.

  2. Fry the chops slowly until thoroughly cooked.

Make the gravy and serve

  1. Remove the meat and stir 1 tablespoon of flour into the fat to make gravy.

  2. Add enough milk to achieve a nice consistency for the gravy.

  3. Season the gravy with salt and pepper, and cook well.

  4. Serve each chop with a spoonful of gravy on top.

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

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Pork + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,386 recipes

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

  4. Pork + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,933 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Eggs
Binds the cracker crumbs to the pork so the coating adheres during frying.
Cracker crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating that browns in the hot fat.
Flour
Thickens the pan fat and milk into a smooth gravy.
Milk
Liquid that turns the flour-thickened fat into creamy gravy.
Lard
Fat for frying that conducts heat and promotes browning of the coating.
Pork chops
Main protein; slow frying cooks the meat through while keeping it moist.

The step that matters

Fry the chops slowly until thoroughly cooked. Frying too hot browns the crumb coating before the thick chop's centre is cooked through, so the meat can stay underdone. Gentle heat lets the heat reach the centre while the coating browns evenly.

“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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