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Salt Fish Balls

Salt fish balls are made from salt fish, potatoes, egg, pepper, and fried in hot fat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,305 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Salt Fish Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Pick the fish into small pieces, removing any bones.

  2. Pare the potatoes and cut them into quarters.

Make the mixture

  1. Cook the potatoes and fish together in boiling water until tender.

  2. Drain the water and mash the mixture until very light.

  3. Add the pepper and, when slightly cool, mix in the beaten egg.

Fry and serve

  1. Drop spoonfuls of the mixture into smoking hot fat.

  2. Fry until brown, cooking only three or four at a time to maintain fat temperature.

  3. Drain on soft paper and serve with a white sauce.

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. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

  2. Fish + potatotop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together134 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e,z)-2,6-nonadienal (cucumber, melon).

  3. Fish + peppertop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,948 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  4. Fish + eggtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,782 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Potato + eggtop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,978 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

Salt fish
Provides the main savoury flavour and salty character of the balls.
Potatoes
Bind the mixture and give it a light, soft interior when mashed.
Egg
Binds the mashed mixture together so the balls hold their shape while frying.

The step that matters

Frying in smoking hot fat, a few at a time. Hot fat sets the outside quickly and browns it, forming a crust that holds the ball together. Adding too many at once drops the fat temperature, so the balls soak up oil, turn greasy and may fall apart.

Swap the potato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, egg, pepper. 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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