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Salsify Fritters

Salsify fritters are fried cakes made from mashed salsify, flour, butter, and seasonings, coated in breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Butter and bread 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 ↓

Salsify Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Mash the salsify until smooth.

  2. Mix in the flour, butter, salt, and black pepper.

  3. Form the mixture into small cakes.

Coat and fry

  1. Dip each cake in egg, then coat with bread crumbs.

  2. Fry in boiling lard until golden brown.

  3. Alternatively, dredge the cakes in flour and fry like pancakes, using more lard.

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. Butter + breadtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,232 recipes

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

  2. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Egg + breadtop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together22,662 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Pepper + breadtop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,964 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Butter and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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

Salsify
Forms the soft, mild body of the fritter.
Flour
Absorbs moisture and helps the mashed salsify hold its shape.
Butter
Adds richness and a softer texture to the mixture.
Egg
Acts as a binder so the bread crumbs stick to each cake.
Fine bread crumbs
Forms a crisp, golden crust during frying.
Lard
Conducts heat for even frying and browns the surface.

The step that matters

Fry in boiling lard until golden brown. Hot fat sears the outside quickly, sealing the crumb coating and limiting how much oil the cake absorbs. If the lard is not hot enough, the fritters soak up grease and turn heavy; if it is too hot, the coating browns before the centre cooks.

“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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