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Dessert

Spanish Fritters

Fried bread fritters soaked in cream, spices, and egg, served with butter, wine, and a sugar sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Nutmeg and cinnamon match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 11,917 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Spanish Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the French roll into finger-thick lengths.

Soak and fry

  1. Soak the pieces in cream, nutmeg, sugar, cinnamon, and egg until well soaked.

  2. Fry the soaked pieces until golden brown.

Serve

  1. Serve with butter, wine, and a sugar sauce.

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. Nutmeg + cinnamontop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together11,917 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  4. Cream + saucetop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,787 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  5. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

French roll
Forms the base of the fritters, soaking up the custard mixture to become tender inside.
Egg
Binds the soaking liquid and helps the fritters set and hold together when fried.
Cream
Adds richness and moisture, so the bread soaks through and stays soft inside.
Sugar
Sweetens the soaking mixture and encourages browning in the frying pan.

The step that matters

Fry the soaked pieces until golden brown. Frying over moderate heat browns the sugars and proteins on the surface while the soaked interior cooks through. Too hot and the outside burns before the centre sets; too cool and the fritters absorb excess oil and turn greasy.

“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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