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Cheese Balls

Cheese balls are small fried balls made from grated cheese, bread crumbs, eggs, and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Cheese Balls

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Cheese Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. In a bowl, combine the grated cheese, bread crumbs, and beaten eggs.

  2. Form the mixture into small balls.

  3. Roll the balls in additional bread crumbs.

Cook

  1. In a skillet, melt the butter over medium heat.

  2. Fry the cheese balls in the butter until golden brown.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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

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

  2. Cheese + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,130 recipes

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

  3. Cheese + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,962 recipes

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

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

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

  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

Grated cheese
Provides the main flavor and melts to bind the balls.
Bread crumbs
Add body and absorb moisture so the balls hold their shape.
Eggs
Bind the mixture together so it holds its shape while frying.
Butter
Conducts heat in the skillet and helps the outside brown golden.

The step that matters

Fry the cheese balls in the butter until golden brown. Medium heat browns the crumb coating through Maillard browning without burning it. Too high a heat scorches the outside while the cheese inside stays cold and unmelted.

“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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