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Potato Croquettes
Mashed potato 1 well beaten egg 1/4 teaspoon onion juice Beat mashed potato very light, add the beaten egg and onion juice, form while hot into rolls. Crumb, egg and crumb again, and fry in deep fat till a golden brown. Serve with white sauce in which parsley has been chopped fine.
A straightforward croquette in the old style: hot mashed potato bound with egg, breaded twice, and deep fried. The recipe assumes you already have leftover mashed potato on hand and gives no quantity, so work from what you have.
- Quantity and yieldThe recipe gives no quantity for the potato. As a working guide, about 1 lb (2 cups) of stiff mashed potato with one egg will make roughly eight croquettes, enough for four as a side; for much more than that, use a second egg.
- The potato must be dryThis is the hinge. Mashed potato made with milk and butter for the table is too loose to hold a shape in hot fat. Use potato mashed dry, or spread it in a pan over low heat for a few minutes to drive off moisture before adding the egg.
- Onion juiceAn old shortcut for onion flavour without pieces: grate half an onion and press the pulp through a sieve, or grate on a microplane and use the liquid. A quarter teaspoon of grated onion, or a pinch of onion powder, does the same work.
- "Crumb, egg and crumb again"Roll in fine dry breadcrumbs, then beaten egg, then crumbs a second time. Panko will not stay put on a soft croquette as well as fine crumbs do.
- Forming while hotShaping hot is easier, but the croquettes fry far better chilled. Form, bread, then refrigerate 30 minutes so they hold together in the fat.
- Frying temperatureThe original gives none. Use 375F and fry two to three minutes, turning once, until golden. Fat that is too cool is absorbed into the croquettes and they turn greasy and may break open; crowding the pan drops the temperature.
- The white sauceA plain béchamel: 2 tablespoons butter, 2 tablespoons flour, 1 cup milk, cooked until it no longer tastes of raw flour, with salt, pepper and a good handful of chopped parsley off the heat.
- SeasoningNo salt is listed. If the potato was already seasoned when first cooked it may need none, but taste the mixture before shaping.
Potato croquettes belong to the long borrowing of French kitchen technique into English and American home cooking: croquette comes from croquer, to crunch, and the form -- a bound purée or mince, breaded and fried -- was a familiar way of dignifying leftovers on a middle-class table. The double breading and the parsley white sauce are both signatures of that training.