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Fried Eggplant

Slices of eggplant coated in breadcrumbs and fried until golden.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Fried Eggplant

Why it works: Bread and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 27,232 recipes. Both carry delta-decalactone, which smells sweet, creamy. The science ↓

Fried Eggplant

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Slice the eggplants into ¼ inch thick slices.

  2. Soak the slices in cold water with salt for 30 minutes.

  3. Drain the slices and lay them on a napkin.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip each slice in bread crumbs, then in the beaten egg, and coat again with bread crumbs.

  2. Heat butter in a frying pan until hot.

  3. Fry the slices for about 10 minutes until light brown.

  4. Optionally, peel the eggplants before frying or after cooking.

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.

Photo for illustrative purposes only · Contact us to use it

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. Bread + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  2. Bread + eggtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

  3. Eggplant + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together265 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  5. Eggplant + buttertop 26% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together507 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Eggplants
Form the main body of the dish, becoming soft and tender when fried.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden coating that browns during frying.
Beaten egg
Binds the bread crumbs to the eggplant so the coating holds during frying.
Butter
Conducts heat in the pan and adds fat for browning and flavour.

The step that matters

Frying the coated slices. Butter must be hot before the slices go in, or the coating absorbs fat and turns greasy instead of crisping. Frying in a single layer keeps the pan temperature steady so the crumbs brown evenly.

Swap the eggplant

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

  1. Asparagusfits better
  2. Leekfits better
  3. Chivefits better
  4. Eggplantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against bread, egg, butter. 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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