This is another recipe from Charmaine Solomon’s The Complete Asian Cookbook which is this month’s feature cookbook on The Cook Book Guru. I thought the croquettes were fantastic, stupendous, etc.  BUT (and, as you can see, it is a big “BUT”), I did not make them – Maus did and, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get her to say they were worth the effort.

Croquettes do take a bit of work.  You have to chop all the ingredients for the filling, cook the filling, cook and mash the potatoes, shape and crumb the croquettes and then fry them.  They are not something you can quickly whip up for the family after work.

Even though I really like them, there was no distinctive flavour.  It was just a nice combo.  Charmaine suggests serving them with chilli sauce, which we did.  The only trouble is, the chilli sauce became the strongest flavour.

We found we used more potato for each croquette than suggested. Because of this, we have left-over filling which we have frozen.  At least, the next time we feel like having croquettes, we will only have to make the mashed potato, shape and crumb them.

This recipe is in the Singaporean chapter of Charmaine’s book.

Ingredients:

• 2 tbs* oil
• 1 medium onion, finely chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• ½ tsp fresh ginger, finely grated
• 2 fresh green chillies, seeded and chopped
• 2 tsp ground coriander
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 500g minced beef
• 1½ tsp salt, plus extra to taste
• ½ tsp freshly ground black pepper, plus extra to taste
• 2 tbs* fresh coriander leaves, finely chopped (As is normally our want, we were very generous with the coriander.)
• 6 spring onions, finely chopped
• 1kg potatoes
• 1 egg, beaten
• dry breadcrumbs, for coating
• extra oil for deep-frying

*These are 20mil tablespoons.

Method:

1. Heat the oil in a wok or frying pan over low heat.
2. Add the onion, garlic, ginger and chilli and stir-fry until soft.
3. Add the ground coriander, cumin and beef and cook, breaking up any large lumps of meat, until the meat changes colour.
4. Add the salt and pepper and cook until meat is cooked. (There should be no liquid left in the pan.)
5. Stir in the coriander leaves and allow to cool.
6. When cold, stir in the spring onions.
7. Boil and mash the potatoes.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.
8. Take two tablespoons of mashed potato (we used more than that) in one hand, flatten slightly, then put 1 tablespoon of meat mixture in the centre. Mould the potato around the meat to form an oval shape, enclosing the meat.
9. Set aside on a large tray and repeat with the remaining meat and potato.
10. Dip each croquette first into the egg, then into the breadcrumbs.
11. Heat the extra oil in a large frying pan over medium heat.  When the oil is hot, deep-fry the croquettes, in batches, until golden brown.
12. Drain on paper towel and serve hot with chilli sauce.