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Croquettes of Potatoes

A fried potato mixture shaped into croquettes, seasoned with pepper and salt, coated in flour, egg, and breadcrumbs.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Pepper and parsley match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 2% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 34,122 recipes. Both carry 4'-methylacetophenone, which smells bitter almond. The science ↓

Croquettes of Potatoes

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the potatoes

  1. Boil potatoes until tender, then drain and dry them.

  2. Pass the potatoes through a wire sieve into a bowl.

Make the mixture

  1. In a saucepan, heat the butter and milk until hot, then add the potatoes.

  2. Season with cayenne or black pepper and coarse sea salt, then mix in the egg until well combined.

  3. Transfer the mixture to a plate and let it cool.

Shape, coat and fry

  1. Once cool, lightly flour a board and shape the mixture into balls and cork-shaped pieces.

  2. Coat each piece in egg and then in bread crumbs, reshaping as necessary.

  3. Heat oil in a frying pan and fry the croquettes until golden brown.

  4. Drain on kitchen paper and serve on a folded doily with fried parsley.

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. Pepper + parsleytop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

  2. Potato + parsleytop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,855 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

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

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

  4. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  5. Potato + peppertop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together8,305 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Potatoes
Form the bulk of the croquette, giving a soft, starchy interior once cooked.
Butter
Adds richness and fat, making the mashed potato smoother and more tender.
Milk
Adds moisture so the potato mixture becomes soft and easy to shape.
Egg
Binds the mixture together and forms a coating that helps the crumbs stick.
Bread crumbs
Form a crisp, golden outer crust when the croquettes are fried.

The step that matters

Let the mixture cool before shaping. A warm, soft potato mixture is too sticky to hold its shape and can break apart in the coating and oil. Cooling lets the starch firm up so the pieces keep their form.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Shallotfits about as well
  2. Chivefits about as well
  3. Potatothe original
  4. Capsicumfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, milk, egg, pepper, flour, bread, parsley. 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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