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Scallops, Fried

Fried scallops coated in a butter‑flour‑milk batter and served with parsley garnish.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 ↓

Scallops, Fried

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. Drain the scallops on a cloth.

  2. Sift the flour into a bowl.

  3. Add a pinch of salt.

  4. Melt the butter.

  5. Beat the egg.

  6. Stir the butter and egg into the flour.

  7. Add the milk and mix until smooth.

  8. Adjust with more butter or milk if too thick.

  9. Let the batter stand for an hour.

  10. Stir in the chopped parsley.

Fry and serve

  1. Season the scallops with salt, white pepper, and cayenne.

  2. Dip each scallop into the batter.

  3. Drop them into hot fat.

  4. Fry until golden brown, about 5 to 6 minutes.

  5. Drain on a cloth.

  6. Pile on a hot dish.

  7. Garnish with fried parsley.

  8. Serve with lobster or tomato sauce.

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

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

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

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  4. Flour + parsleytop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together16,675 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. White pepper + parsleytop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together1,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: myrcene (balsamic, herbaceous).

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

Flour
Forms the body of the batter and sets into a crisp coating when fried.
Butter
Adds richness and helps the coating brown golden in the fat.
Milk
Hydrates the flour to make a smooth, pourable batter that clings to the scallops.
Scallops
Provide the tender, sweet centre inside the crisp golden coating.
Parsley
Adds fresh, herbal aroma to the batter.

The step that matters

Drop them into hot fat.. Hot fat sets the batter quickly so the coating crisps and seals. If the fat is too cool, the batter absorbs oil, becomes greasy, and can slide off the scallops.

Swap the white pepper

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

  1. Nutmegfits better
  2. Thymefits better
  3. Tarragonfits better
  4. White pepperthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against scallop, butter, flour, milk, pepper, 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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