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Cold Bacon and Eggs

A fried ball made from leftover bacon, eggs, and potato, optionally coated with egg and cracker crumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Egg and potato are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 29% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 4,978 recipes. Both carry (e)-2-octenal, which smells fatty, green. The science ↓

Cold Bacon and Eggs

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Chop the leftover bacon and eggs finely in a wooden bowl.

  2. Add mashed or cold chopped potato and bacon gravy, if available. Mix well.

  3. Mould the mixture into small balls.

Coat and fry

  1. Roll each ball in raw egg.

  2. Coat with cracker crumbs.

  3. Fry the balls in a skillet until light brown on both sides.

  4. Serve 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. Egg + potatotop 29% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,978 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Leftover eggs
Bind the chopped mixture together and add body to the balls.
Mashed or cold chopped potato
Adds bulk and moisture, giving the balls a soft, tender interior.
Raw egg
Forms a sticky layer that helps the cracker crumbs adhere to each ball.
Cracker crumbs
Create a crisp, golden outer coating when fried.
Leftover bacon
Contributes savoury flavour and fat that helps the balls brown in the skillet.

The step that matters

Frying until light brown on both sides. The balls are already cooked, so the goal is browning, not cooking through. Frying over moderate heat lets the crumb coating crisp and brown before the interior dries out, and turning them gives an even crust.

“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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