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Egg Cutlets

Egg Cutlets are small fried patties made from chopped hard‑boiled eggs, bread crumbs, Parmesan, spices, and coated in egg whites and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Egg Cutlets

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare and shape

  1. In a bowl, mix the chopped eggs, bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese, butter, curry powder, nutmeg, pepper, salt, and the beaten egg yolks from 4 eggs.

  2. Shape the mixture into small cutlet forms.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip each cutlet into the egg whites, then coat with brown bread crumbs.

  2. Fry the cutlets in hot butter or lard until golden brown, then drain well.

Finish and serve

  1. Insert a small piece of macaroni into each cutlet to resemble a bone.

  2. Serve very hot, garnished with sprigs of fried parsley.

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 + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  3. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  4. Nutmeg + peppertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  5. Parmesan cheese + buttertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,163 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Hard-boiled eggs
Chopped eggs form the body of the cutlet and help hold its shape.
Bread crumbs
Absorb moisture and bind the mixture so it can be shaped.
Parmesan cheese
Adds savory, salty flavor and helps the cutlet brown when fried.
Butter
Carries flavor and browns the cutlet surface during frying.
Egg whites
Form a sticky layer that helps the brown crumbs adhere and crisp.

The step that matters

Frying in hot fat. The fat must be hot enough to sear the crumb coating quickly, forming a crisp seal so the cutlets do not absorb excess grease or fall apart. Draining well removes surface fat so the coating stays crisp.

Swap the nutmeg

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (egg, bread, parmesan cheese, butter, pepper, parsley):

  1. Thymefits about as well
  2. Nutmegthe original
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Marjoramfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, bread, parmesan cheese, butter, pepper, parsley. 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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