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Potato Rissoles

A dish of mashed potato balls seasoned with salt, pepper, parsley, onions, and egg yolks, fried until cooked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Potato and onion are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 3% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,023 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Potato Rissoles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Mash the potatoes and season with salt and white pepper or cayenne.

  2. Mix in the minced parsley and green onions or shallots.

  3. Add the egg yolks to bind the mixture.

  4. Roll the mixture into small balls.

Fry

  1. Fry the balls in plenty of lard or butter over moderate heat until cooked through.

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 + oniontop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,023 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  3. Parsley + oniontop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

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

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

  5. White pepper + parsleytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

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

What each ingredient does

Mashed potatoes
Form the bulk of the rissoles and give a soft, tender interior.
Egg yolks
Bind the mixture so the balls hold their shape while frying.
Lard or butter
Fries the balls, adding richness and browning the outside.
Green onions or shallots
Add mild onion aroma and flavor throughout the mixture.

The step that matters

Fry the balls until cooked through. Use plenty of fat and moderate heat so the outside browns without the centre staying raw. Moderate heat lets the heat reach the middle before the surface darkens too much.

Swap the white pepper

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (potato, parsley, onion, egg, butter):

  1. Thymefits better
  2. Capersfits better
  3. Garlicfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against potato, parsley, onion, egg, butter. 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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