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Fish Balls

Fish Balls are made from boiled codfish, potatoes, dripping, eggs, and salt, formed into balls and fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 15% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,355 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Fish Balls

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Boil the codfish and potatoes in water until soft.

  2. Drain the mixture, then add the dripping and beat until light and smooth.

  3. Allow to cool slightly, then mix in the beaten eggs and salt to taste.

  4. Add flour as needed to stiffen the mixture.

  5. Use stock to adjust consistency.

Shape and fry

  1. Form into balls and brown in deep fat.

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 + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,355 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

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

Egg and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 106,462 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

Codfish
Provides the main flavour and body of the fish balls.
Raw potatoes
Starch bulks out the mixture and helps it hold together when shaped.
Dripping
Adds fat that makes the mixture rich and smooth.
Eggs
Bind the mixture so the balls keep their shape.
Flour
Stiffens the mixture so it can be formed into balls.

The step that matters

Browning in deep fat. The balls must be fully heated through as well as browned on the outside. Browning happens at the surface, so frying too hot can colour them before the centre is hot, while frying too cool leaves them greasy.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Arrowrootfits better
  2. Chivefits better
  3. Shallotfits better
  4. Potatothe original

Fit is the average pairing score against egg, flour. 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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