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Cutlets, Rice, and Lentils

A dish of rice and lentil cutlets served with tomato sauce.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Parsley and thyme match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,057 recipes. Both carry cuminaldehyde, which smells Spicy, cumin. The science ↓

Cutlets, Rice, and Lentils

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the filling

  1. Boil the rice and lentils until tender, then drain.

  2. Chop the onion, garlic, tarragon, parsley, and thyme finely. Mix the chopped ingredients with salt and pepper.

Shape and cook

  1. Bind the mixture with the beaten egg and shape into cutlets.

  2. Coat the cutlets in egg and breadcrumbs.

  3. Fry in butter or oil until golden brown.

  4. Serve with tomato 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. Parsley + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

  2. Tarragon + thymetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together528 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Tarragon + parsleytop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  4. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  5. Clove + thymetop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together4,108 recipes

    Shared aroma: cuminaldehyde (Spicy, cumin).

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

What each ingredient does

Rice
Cooked until tender, it forms the bulk of the cutlet and gives them body.
Lentils
Cooked until tender, they add protein-rich bulk and help hold the cutlet together.
Egg
Binds the cooked mixture so the cutlets hold their shape while frying.
Onion
Adds savoury depth and moisture to the mixture as it cooks.
Garlic
Adds aroma and savoury flavour to the cutlet mixture.

The step that matters

Draining the cooked rice and lentils. Excess water left in the cooked rice and lentils makes the mixture soft and wet, so the cutlets may not bind or hold their shape when shaped and fried.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (rice, lentils, onion, garlic, tarragon, parsley, thyme):

  1. Cuminfits better
  2. Marjoramfits better
  3. Capersfits better
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against rice, lentils, onion, garlic, tarragon, parsley, thyme. 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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