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Brain Fritters

Fritters made from mashed brains mixed with milk, prepared flour and an egg, then fried in hot fat.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and flour are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 14% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 78,219 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Brain Fritters

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the brains

  1. Wash the brains.

  2. Remove the fibers and skin from the brains.

  3. Drop the brains into boiling water and cook gently for 15 minutes.

  4. Transfer the brains to ice-cold water until stiff and white.

  5. Wipe the brains.

Make the batter

  1. Mash the brains to a batter with a wooden spoon.

  2. Season the batter with salt and pepper.

  3. Beat in an egg.

  4. Beat in the milk.

  5. Beat in the prepared flour.

  6. Fry a small amount in boiling fat to test.

Fry and serve

  1. Drop the batter by tablespoonfuls into the fat and fry quickly.

  2. Shake the fritters in a heated colander to remove excess fat.

  3. Serve hot.

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. Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together78,219 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Flour + peppertop 19% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together50,459 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  3. Milk + peppertop 22% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together26,984 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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

Brains
Provides the soft, tender body that gives the fritters their creamy interior.
Milk
Moistens the mashed brains, loosening the batter so it can be dropped by spoonfuls.
Prepared flour
Thickens the batter and helps the fritters hold their shape in the hot fat.

The step that matters

Cook the brains gently. A gentle simmer keeps the brains tender and firm. A hard boil toughens the proteins and can break the brains apart, making the batter hard to mash smoothly.

“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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