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French Batter

A light batter made with butter, water, flour, salt, and egg whites, used for frying fruit, meat, or vegetables.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

French Batter

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Cut the butter into small bits and pour the boiling water over it.

  2. Once dissolved, add the cold water until the mixture is not quite milk warm.

  3. Gradually mix in the flour until smooth.

  4. Add salt if making fruit fritters, or more if for meat or vegetables.

  5. If the batter is too thick, add a little water to reach the proper consistency.

Finish and use

  1. Just before using, stir in the beaten egg whites.

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. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Butter + meattop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together7,594 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. Meat + eggtop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,432 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,4-decadienal (seaweed).

Butter and flour 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

Flour
Forms the structure of the batter as its starch sets during cooking.
Egg whites
Beaten to a froth, they add air and lightness to the batter.
Butter
Adds richness and tenderness, and helps the batter stay smooth.

The step that matters

Stir in the beaten egg whites just before using. Beaten whites hold air that gives lightness, but they slowly deflate and lose volume if left standing. Adding them at the last moment keeps the batter light when it cooks.

“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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