These may be made with any kind of cooked meat, fish, rice, potatoes, etc., or from a mixture of several ingredients, when mixed with a thick white sauce, as follows: Melt the butter or dripping in a saucepan, when hot add the dry cornstarch or flour. Stir till well mixed. Add 1/3 of the hot milk and stir as it boils and thickens, add the remainder of the hot milk gradually. The sauce should be very thick. Add the seasoning, and mix it while hot with the meat or fish. It is improved by adding a beaten egg just before the sauce is taken from the fire. When cold, shape into rolls or like a pear, roll lightly in beaten egg, then in bread crumbs, and fry in deep hot fat. Drain on coarse brown paper. If the mixture be too soft to handle easily stir in enough fine cracker or soft bread crumbs to stiffen it, but never flour.
Public School Domestic Science (1898).