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Dessert

Apple Croquettes

Apple croquettes are fried apple cakes made from stewed apples, butter, sugar, cinnamon, cornstarch, salt, egg yolk, and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Apple and cinnamon are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 4% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 5,598 recipes. Both carry methyl cinnamate, which smells strawberry. The science ↓

Apple Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Make the apple mixture

  1. Press the juice from the stewed, dried apples to make 1 pint.

  2. Mash the apples very fine, then add butter, sugar, and cinnamon.

  3. Heat the mixture over the fire until hot.

  4. Stir in cornstarch and salt, wetting to a thin paste with cold water.

  5. Pour into a greased pan and let it cool.

Shape and coat

  1. Shape the mixture into small croquettes.

  2. Dip each croquette in beaten egg yolk and dredge with breadcrumbs.

Fry and serve

  1. Fry in deep hot fat until golden brown.

  2. Drain and serve very hot.

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. Apple + cinnamontop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,598 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl cinnamate (strawberry).

  2. Sugar + cinnamontop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together30,779 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Apple + buttertop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,706 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-nonenal (cardboard, fatty).

  4. Butter + cinnamontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together17,784 recipes

    Shared aroma: anethole (sweet, anise).

  5. Butter + eggtop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

Sugar and cinnamon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 30,779 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

Stewed, dried apples
Provide the main body and apple flavour of the croquettes.
Cornstarch
Thickens the mixture so it holds its shape when cooled and shaped.
Egg yolk
Acts as a binder and helps the breadcrumb coating adhere and brown.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a softer, more tender interior.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool fully before shaping. Cornstarch thickens as it cools and sets. If the mixture is still warm or loose, the croquettes will be soft and may split or slump in the hot fat.

Swap the apple

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (butter, sugar, cinnamon, egg):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raisinfits better
  3. Figfits about as well
  4. Applethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, sugar, cinnamon, egg. 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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