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Beef Croquettes

Beef croquettes are small fried balls made from chopped beef, bread crumbs, milk, and seasonings.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Beef Croquettes

Why it works: Beef and pepper are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 18,971 recipes. Both carry 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine, which smells earthy, pea. The science ↓

Beef Croquettes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Chop the cold beef finely to yield 1 cup.

  2. Add 2 cups of fine bread crumbs and moisten with 3 tablespoons of milk.

  3. Season with ¾ teaspoon of coarse sea salt and ¼ teaspoon of pepper.

  4. Form the mixture into balls.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip each ball in the beaten egg, then roll in fine cracker crumbs.

  2. Fry in hot beef drippings until golden brown.

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. Beef + peppertop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together18,971 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).

  2. Bread + milktop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  3. Beef + milktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together3,759 recipes

    Shared aroma: 1-hexanal (fruit).

  4. Beef + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-acetyl-1-pyrroline (popcorn, roasted).

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

Cold beef
Provides the main filling and meaty flavor of the croquettes.
Bread crumbs
Absorb the milk and bind with the beef to give the mixture a shapeable body.
Milk
Moistens the crumbs so the mixture holds together and stays tender.
Egg
Binds the coating so the cracker crumbs adhere to the balls during frying.

The step that matters

Fry in hot beef drippings until golden brown. The fat must be hot enough to brown the crumb coating quickly. If it is too cool, the croquettes absorb excess grease and turn heavy and soggy before the crust sets.

“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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