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Fish Cakes

Fish cakes made from cooked fish, mashed potatoes, butter, egg, salt, and pepper, then fried.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 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 ↓

Fish Cakes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Chop the fish finely.

  2. Melt the butter in a saucepan.

  3. Add the fish and mashed potatoes.

  4. Bind the mixture with the yolk of the egg.

  5. Season the mixture with salt and pepper.

  6. Spread the mixture onto a plate.

Shape and coat

  1. Form into small flat cakes.

  2. Dip the cakes in egg.

  3. Coat the cakes with breadcrumbs.

Fry and serve

  1. Fry the cakes in hot oil until golden brown.

  2. Drain the cakes carefully.

  3. Serve the cakes on a hot dish.

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 + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,488 recipes

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

  3. Potato + buttertop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,456 recipes

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

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Fish
Provides the main body and flavour of the cakes.
Mashed potatoes
Adds starch and softness, helping the mixture hold together and stay moist.
Egg
Binds the mixture and, as a dip, helps breadcrumbs stick to the cakes.
Butter
Adds richness and flavour to the mixture.

The step that matters

Fry the cakes in hot oil until golden brown. The oil must be hot enough to brown the breadcrumb coating quickly. If it is too cool, the cakes absorb oil and turn greasy before the coating browns, and the fish inside can overcook while the outside catches up.

Swap the potato

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

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

Fit is the average pairing score against fish, butter, 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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