Skip to main content
Main

Forcemeat Fritters

Fritters made from forcemeat, breadcrumbs, butter, eggs, cream, herbs, and served with fried egg slices, brown sauce, and red‑currant jelly.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Parsley and pepper 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 ↓

Forcemeat Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the mixture

  1. Rub the butter into the breadcrumbs.

  2. Add the parsley, leeks, herbs, salt, and pepper.

  3. Stir in the eggs and cream.

  4. Shape the mixture into balls.

Fry and serve

  1. Fry the balls in hot butter or oil in a frying pan.

  2. Serve garnished with the fried slices of egg, brown sauce, and red‑currant jelly.

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. Parsley + peppertop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together34,122 recipes

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

  2. Parsley + leektop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together759 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

  3. Butter + creamtop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  4. Leek + peppertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together965 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Butter + parsleytop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together28,563 recipes

    Shared aroma: trans-2-hexenal (green, leafy).

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

What each ingredient does

Breadcrumbs
Form the bulk of the mixture and absorb the butter, cream and egg to hold the balls together.
Butter
Adds richness and flavour, and helps the fritters brown when fried.
Eggs
Bind the mixture so the balls hold their shape while frying.
Cream
Adds moisture and softness so the mixture is tender rather than dry.

The step that matters

Shape the mixture into balls. The mixture must be moist enough to hold together but not so wet that it spreads or falls apart. Breadcrumbs absorb the liquid, so the balance of cream and egg against the crumbs decides whether the balls keep their shape in the hot fat.

Swap the leek

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

  1. Potatofits about as well
  2. Spinachfits about as well
  3. Chivefits about as well
  4. Leekthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against butter, egg, cream, parsley, pepper. 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.

You might also like

Leek SoupLeek Soup31 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipes