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Croquettes of Fish

Fish croquettes are fried balls of minced fish mixed with egg, flour, milk, and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Fish and bread are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,668 recipes. Both carry 2-undecenal, which smells sweet. The science ↓

Croquettes of Fish

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fish

  1. Remove bones from the fish and mince it.

  2. Mix the minced fish with salt, beaten egg, flour, and milk.

Shape and coat

  1. Roll the mixture into balls.

  2. Brush the balls with egg and dredge in bread crumbs.

Fry and make gravy

  1. Fry the balls until golden brown.

  2. Make gravy by stewing the bones and tail in water.

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. Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  2. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  3. Fish + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,432 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

  4. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, 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

Fish
Provides the main protein that sets into the body of the croquettes when cooked.
Egg
Binds the mixture and gives the brushed coating that helps crumbs adhere.
All-purpose flour
Helps bind the minced fish so the balls hold their shape.
Milk
Adds moisture that keeps the croquettes from drying out.
Bread crumbs
Forms a crisp coating that browns when the balls are fried.

The step that matters

Fry the balls until golden brown. The coated balls must cook through in the hot oil while the crumbs brown. Frying too hot browns the outside before the centre is cooked, while frying too gently leaves the coating greasy and soft.

“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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