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Fried Mush

A fried cornmeal mush made by boiling a cornmeal and milk mixture, then slicing, egg-dipping, breadcrumb coating, and frying.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,466 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Fried Mush

Ingredients

Directions

Make the mush

  1. Boil 1 quart of water in a pot.

  2. In a bowl, mix 1 pint of cold milk, 1 pint of cornmeal, and 1 teaspoon of salt.

  3. Once the water is boiling, gradually pour in the cornmeal mixture while stirring continuously.

  4. Let it boil for 1 hour, stirring often to prevent burning.

Shape and fry

  1. Slice the mixture into pieces.

  2. Dip each slice in beaten egg.

  3. Coat each slice with bread crumbs.

  4. Fry the coated slices in boiling lard 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.

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. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

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

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

  3. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Cornmeal
Forms the thick body of the mush as its starch swells and sets when cooked.
Milk
Adds richness and softness to the mush, giving a creamier texture than water alone.
Egg
Binds the sliced mush so the bread crumb coating adheres before frying.
Bread crumbs
Creates a crisp, browned crust when the coated slices are fried.

The step that matters

Stirring during the long boil. Cornmeal thickens quickly and its starches settle and scorch on the bottom of the pot. Frequent stirring keeps the mixture even and prevents burning over the hour-long cook.

“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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