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Salmon Croquettes

A fried croquette made with milk, flour, butter, parsley, egg yolk, and canned salmon, coated in cracker crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Salmon Croquettes

Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Salmon Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the base

  1. In a saucepan, combine milk, flour, butter, parsley, and egg yolk. Cook over medium heat until thickened.

  2. Allow the mixture to cool, then fold in the canned salmon.

Shape and fry

  1. Shape the mixture into croquettes and roll them in cracker crumbs.

  2. Heat oil in a deep pan and fry the croquettes 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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Milk
Forms the liquid base that flour thickens into a sauce to bind the salmon.
Flour
Thickens the milk as its starch swells and sets when heated, giving the mixture body.
Butter
Adds richness and flavor to the sauce and helps it feel smooth.
Egg yolk
Adds richness and helps bind the mixture as it cooks and sets.
Canned salmon
Provides the main flavor and protein, with flakes that give the croquettes texture.
Cracker crumbs
Forms a coating that browns and crisps when fried in hot oil.

The step that matters

Cool the mixture before shaping. A hot, loose mixture is too soft to hold its shape. As it cools, the thickened starch firms up, so the croquettes keep their form and do not fall apart in the oil.

Swap the parsley

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

  1. Capersfits better
  2. Nutmegfits better
  3. Cinnamonfits about as well
  4. Parsleythe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, flour, butter, egg, salmon. 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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