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Rissoles

Rissoles are small meat pastries made with cold poultry, bread crumbs, butter, onion, egg yolks, and puff pastry, fried in lard.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Rissoles

Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Rissoles

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Pick the meat from the bones and skin of the cold poultry and weigh it.

  2. Add the bread-crumbs, melted butter, minced onion, pepper, salt, and egg yolks to the poultry and mix well to bind.

Shape the rissoles

  1. Roll out the puff pastry thinly and cut it into 2-inch square pieces.

  2. Place a teaspoonful of the mixture in the center of each square.

  3. Fold the pastry over and shape it with a cutter.

  4. Brush the shapes with egg.

  5. Dip them in bread-crumbs.

Fry and serve

  1. Fry in lard until golden brown.

  2. Serve dry, ensuring the edges are sealed.

  3. Garnish with fried parsley.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  3. Onion + parsleytop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together25,843 recipes

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

  4. Onion + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together68,474 recipes

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

  5. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

    Shared aroma: (e)-2-octenal (fatty, green).

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

What each ingredient does

Cold poultry
Provides the main filling, bound together so it holds its shape when fried.
Egg yolks
Bind the filling and add richness, helping it hold together.
Bread-crumbs
Absorb the melted butter and help bind the filling into a firm mixture.
Melted butter
Adds fat and moisture, giving the filling a richer texture.
Puff pastry
Forms a flaky outer casing that becomes crisp and golden when fried.

The step that matters

Sealing the edges before frying. If the pastry edges are not sealed well, the filling can leak into the hot lard and the rissoles can open or turn greasy. A firm seal keeps the filling enclosed while the pastry cooks.

Swap the onion

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

  1. Shallotfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, butter, pepper, egg, parsley. 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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