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Fish Cutlets

Fish cutlets made from mashed potato and flaked fish, coated in breadcrumbs and fried or baked.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Fish Cutlets

Why it works: Potato and pork are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,668 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓

Fish Cutlets

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the cutlets

  1. Mix equal parts of mashed potato and finely flaked cooked fish.

  2. Moisten the mixture with hot cream or fish sauce and season with coarse sea salt.

  3. Form the mixture into cutlet shapes or round cakes.

Coat and cook

  1. Roll the cutlets in fine bread crumbs.

  2. Dip the cutlets in beaten egg.

  3. Coat the cutlets in crumbs moistened with melted butter.

  4. Lay the cutlets in a pan.

  5. Bake the cutlets at 400°F (200°C) until brown.

  6. Alternatively, brown the cutlets under a gas broiler.

  7. Alternatively, fry the cutlets in salt pork fat.

Serve

  1. Serve the cutlets stacked around a mound of seasoned mashed potatoes.

  2. Decorate the edge of the dish with pickles cut into fancy shapes.

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. Potato + porktop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

  3. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Fish + breadtop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Fish + porktop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together668 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4-heptenal (creamy, biscuit).

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

What each ingredient does

Mashed potato
Adds bulk and softness, keeping the cutlets moist and tender inside.
Cooked fish
Provides the main flavour and protein that gives the cutlets their body.
Beaten egg
Acts as a binder so the bread crumbs adhere to the cutlets.
Fine bread crumbs
Form a crisp outer crust that browns during baking or frying.
Melted butter
Adds fat to the crumb coating, promoting browning and richness.

The step that matters

Coat and cook. Crumbs need a binding layer of egg to stick, and the cutlets must be cooked until browned so the crust sets and the soft interior holds together.

Swap the potato

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

  1. Potatothe original
  2. Asparagusfits about as well
  3. Leekfits less well
  4. Onionfits less well

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