Pastéis de Bacalhau — Salt Cod Fritters

Name: Pastéis de Bacalhau — Salt Cod Fritters
Total time: 1 h
Yield: 6
Cuisine: Portuguese
Ingredients: 300 g Salt cod (bacalhau), soaked; 400 g Floury potatoes; 2 Eggs; 1 small Onion, grated; Flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped; Grated nutmeg; 1 L Neutral oil for deep-frying; White pepper

Portugal's most-eaten snack: salt cod and mashed potato bound with egg and parsley, shaped between two spoons into rugby-ball quenelles and deep-fried crisp — soft and creamy inside, all edges outside.

Pinagmulan

Recipe ni Portuguese home kitchens · 🏺 Traditional · Everyday cooking of Portuguese households — the plain, produce-led food behind the restaurant classics

Portuguese · traditional dish — An ownerless traditional dish, so no cook is credited. The English title 'Pastéis de bacalhau' redirects to the canonical 'Bolinhos de bacalhau', which is the URL stored. The cited article confirms the mixture — potatoes, codfish, eggs, parsley, onion and sometimes a hint of nutmeg — the two-spoon shaping, deep-frying, and the target texture (crunchy outside, soft and creamy inside). The north/south naming split and the Brazilian bolinho de bacalhau are flagged in the tips as background the article does not itself detail. Quantities and method here are this book's own.

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Mga hakbang

Poach the soaked cod in barely simmering water for 8 minutes, drain, and cool. Remove all skin and bones, then shred the flesh very finely — almost fluffy — with your fingers or two forks.
💡 The finer you shred the cod, the smoother the fritter. Any stray bone is unpleasant, so pick through it carefully.
Mix the shredded cod with the dry mashed potato, grated onion, parsley, nutmeg, white pepper and the eggs until it comes together into a thick, shapeable paste. Taste for salt.
💡 The mix should hold its shape on a spoon. If it is too loose, mash in a little more potato; too stiff, add a splash of the cod poaching water.
Heat the oil to 170–180°C. Using two dessertspoons, scoop the mixture with one and pass it back and forth between the spoons to shape a smooth, three-sided quenelle.
💡 The two-spoon quenelle shape is the signature of a proper pastel de bacalhau — but hand-rolled ovals fry just as well if the shaping defeats you.
Slide the quenelles into the hot oil a few at a time and fry for 3–4 minutes, turning, until deep golden brown and crisp all over. Do not crowd the pan.
💡 Too many at once drops the oil temperature and the fritters soak up grease. Keep the oil hot and work in batches.
Drain on paper. Eat hot as a snack, warm or at room temperature as part of a spread, with olives, salad and a squeeze of lemon.

💡 Mga tip

North and south differ over the name more than the recipe: in the north they are usually bolinhos de bacalhau ('little balls'), in the south pastéis de bacalhau ('pastries'). The cited article files them under bolinhos and does not draw that regional split, so treat the naming note as background.
The same fritter crossed the Atlantic with Portuguese emigrants and is a fixture of Brazilian bar food as the bolinho de bacalhau — a real Lusophone cousin, though the cited article does not detail that link.