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Swedish Timbales

A batter-based dish cooked in a timbale iron, served with optional fillings such as creamed chicken, sweetbreads, or asparagus.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Swedish Timbales

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Mix and sift the flour, salt, and sugar.

  2. Beat the egg and add the milk; gradually mix into the flour.

  3. Add the oil and mix thoroughly.

  4. Pour the batter into a cup.

Fry the timbales

  1. Heat fat to 365°F (185°C) until it can brown a cube of bread in 60 seconds.

  2. Heat the timbale iron in the fat.

  3. When the iron is hot, wipe off excess fat with cheesecloth or tissue paper.

  4. Dip the iron into the batter to three-fourths of its height.

  5. Lower the iron into the fat and cook until golden brown.

  6. Remove from the iron and drain.

Garnish and fill

  1. Garnish by dipping the edges into slightly beaten egg white, then into very finely chopped parsley.

  2. Fill with creamed chicken, sweetbreads, asparagus, or other fillings.

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + sugartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  3. Milk + olivetop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,828 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  4. Flour + eggtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, 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

Flour
Forms the batter's structure, setting into a crisp, hollow shell when fried.
Egg
Binds the batter and adds richness and structure to the shell.
Milk
Adds moisture and helps the batter flow smoothly into a thin coating.
Olive oil or melted butter
Adds fat that tenderises the batter and contributes flavour and light browning.

The step that matters

Dipping the iron into the batter. The iron must be hot and dry before dipping, and the batter should reach only three-fourths of its height. A hot iron sets the batter quickly so it releases cleanly, while excess fat or overfilling can make the shell greasy, heavy, or unable to release.

“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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