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Croquettes of Cold Beef or Mutton

Croquettes made from finely chopped cold beef or mutton mixed with flour, onion, parsley, bread crumbs, and egg, then fried in lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 17,092 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Croquettes of Cold Beef or Mutton

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a bowl, combine the chopped meat, flour, onion, parsley, and bread crumbs.

  2. Add the raw egg and mix until well combined.

  3. Shape the mixture into oval cakes or egg-shaped balls.

Fry

  1. Heat enough lard in a frying pan to cover the croquettes.

  2. Once the lard is hot, carefully add the croquettes and fry until golden brown on all sides.

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. Beef + oniontop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,092 recipes

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

  2. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

  3. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Beef + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

  5. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold beef or mutton
Provides the main body and savory flavor of the croquettes.
Flour
Absorbs moisture and helps bind the mixture together.
Bread crumbs
Add bulk and form a crisp, golden outer coating when fried.
Raw egg
Binds the chopped meat and crumbs so the croquettes hold their shape.

The step that matters

Shape and fry the croquettes evenly. Croquettes that are unevenly packed can crack or fall apart in hot fat. Firm, even shaping helps the binder set and the crumb coating brown uniformly.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Leekfits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against beef, flour, parsley, bread, 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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