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Croquettes of Veal

Croquettes of Veal are fried meatballs made from roasted veal, mushrooms, and sauce, coated in breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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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 ↓

Croquettes of Veal

Ingredients

Directions

Make the filling

  1. Combine the veal and mushrooms in a pot.

  2. Boil enough sauce to thicken, then add the veal mixture.

  3. Season with pepper and nutmeg and stir well.

  4. Spread the mixture on a dish about 1 inch thick.

  5. Cover with buttered paper and cool in the refrigerator.

Shape and coat

  1. Once cooled, cut into about 24 pieces and shape into corks, balls, or pears.

  2. Dip each piece in beaten egg, then roll in bread crumbs.

  3. Place the coated pieces on a dish until ready to fry.

Fry and serve

  1. Heat hog's lard in a pan and fry the croquettes until golden.

  2. Drain on a napkin and serve immediately, garnished 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.

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. Nutmeg + parsleytop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,062 recipes

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

  3. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

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

  4. Mushroom + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,536 recipes

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

  5. Mushroom + peppertop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together13,580 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Roasted veal
Forms the main body of the croquettes and gives them their meaty flavor.
Mushrooms
Add moisture and earthy flavor to the filling.
Sauce
Binds the veal and mushrooms so the mixture holds its shape when cooled.
Beaten eggs
Act as a binder so the bread crumbs stick to the outside.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating when fried.

The step that matters

Cool the filling fully before shaping. A warm or loose filling is soft and sticky, so the pieces can lose their shape or split in the fat. Chilling firms the sauce so the croquettes hold together while frying.

Swap the nutmeg

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

  1. Marjoramfits better
  2. Thymefits about as well
  3. Capersfits about as well
  4. Nutmegthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against veal, mushroom, sauce, pepper, bread, 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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