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Bean Croquettes

Bean croquettes are fried balls made from boiled white soup beans mixed with molasses, vinegar, butter, salt, cayenne, beaten egg, and bread crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Bean Croquettes

Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Bean Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the bean mixture

  1. Boil the beans until tender, then drain and press them through a colander.

  2. Mix in molasses, vinegar, butter, salt, and cayenne.

  3. Let the mixture cool.

Shape and coat

  1. Once cool, form the mixture into small balls.

  2. Dip each ball in the beaten egg, then roll in bread crumbs.

Fry

  1. Fry the croquettes in hot oil 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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

  3. Beans + breadtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together332 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Beans + buttertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,799 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

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

What each ingredient does

White soup beans
Form the bulk of the croquette, giving body and a soft, starchy interior once pressed and cooked.
Egg
Binds the coating so the bread crumbs adhere and form a crisp outer layer.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, browning outer crust when fried.
Molasses
Adds sweetness and a dark, rich flavor to the bean mixture.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that brightens the flavor and balances the sweetness of the molasses.
Butter
Adds fat, contributing richness and a smoother texture to the mixture.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before shaping. Warm bean mixture is soft and sticky, so it is hard to form into balls and may slump or tear. Cooling firms it so the croquettes hold their shape through coating and frying.

Swap the beans

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (molasses, vinegar, butter, egg, bread):

  1. Pecansfits about as well
  2. Peasfits about as well
  3. Almondfits about as well
  4. Beansthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against molasses, vinegar, butter, egg, bread. 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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