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Beef Fritters

A fried batter of minced roast beef, flour, milk, water, and egg whites.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beef Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the batter

  1. Season the minced beef with pepper and salt.

  2. In a bowl, mix flour, milk, and water to make a batter.

  3. Add the whisked egg whites and minced beef to the batter and stir well.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat oil in a pan until boiling.

  2. Drop tablespoonfuls of the batter into the hot oil, keeping them separated.

  3. Fry until golden brown on both sides, about 10 minutes.

  4. Remove and drain on a napkin before serving.

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. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

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

  2. Beef + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,759 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  3. Flour + milktop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Flour and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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 batter's body, giving the fritters structure once fried.
Eggs
Egg whites bind the batter and help it set firm when fried.
Milk
Adds moisture and richness to the batter, helping it brown evenly.

The step that matters

Dropping the batter into hot oil. Oil must be boiling so the batter sets quickly on contact. Cooler oil lets the fritters soak up grease and turn heavy, and crowding the pan drops the oil temperature and makes them stick together.

“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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