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Potato Croquettes
Peel, boil, and mash one quart potatoes, mix with yolks of four eggs and some milk.
Set on the fire, stir two minutes; set on a dish to cool or leave overnight. In the morning add a little milk, mix thoroughly, roll in bread crumbs; divide in cakes and fry in lard. Take off when done; drain, dish, and serve immediately.--Mrs. E.
A plain 19th-century potato croquette, closer to a fried mashed-potato cake than the modern breaded cylinder. The whole point is a stiff, dry mixture, which is why the recipe rests it overnight.
- The hinge: keep the mash dryWet mash will absorb fat and fall apart in the pan. Use a starchy baking potato, drain it thoroughly, and return the pan to low heat for a minute to steam off moisture before mashing.
- A quart of potatoesThe recipe does not say at what stage it is measured; if peeled and cut, that is roughly 1 1/2 to 2 lb of raw potato, yielding perhaps 3 cups of mash. Four yolks is a generous proportion for that quantity; they help set the cakes as they fry.
- "Some milk" and "a little milk"Genuinely ambiguous. Add milk by the tablespoon only until the mash just holds together; the second addition in the morning reads as loosening a mixture that has stiffened in the cold, not thinning it.
- Stirring two minutes on the fireThis cooks the yolks into the mash so it firms rather than curdles. Keep the heat low to moderate and stir constantly, as for a panade.
- The overnight restThe recipe gives a choice: cool on a dish, or leave overnight. Either way, cold, rested mash shapes cleanly and holds in hot fat, and several hours in the refrigerator does the same work.
- CrumbingThe original rolls in crumbs and stops there. Dry, fine crumbs adhere better if the cakes are dipped in beaten egg or milk first; the Victorian version relies on the sticky mash alone and browns more patchily.
- Frying in lardShallow-fry in about 1/2 inch of lard, or any fat with a smoke point above 350F, at 350-365F. Turn once, three to four minutes a side, and drain on paper rather than a cloth.
- YieldAbout 12 cakes of 2 1/2 inches, serving four to six as a side dish. They soften as they sit, which is why the recipe insists on serving immediately.
Croquettes arrived in American cookbooks from French practice, the name coming from croquer, to crunch, and by the 1870s they seem to have been a familiar way of turning yesterday's potatoes and a few yolks into a hot dish for the table. Housekeeping in Old Virginia, compiled by Marion Cabell Tyree from contributions by some 250 Virginia housekeepers and generally dated to 1878 or 1879, is full of these signed short recipes: "Mrs. E." is writing for a cook who already knows what mashed potato should feel like, which is why the milk is never measured.