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Dessert

Chocolate Caramels

A sweet caramel made with milk, unsweetened chocolate, sugar, and molasses.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and molasses are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 11% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,225 recipes. Both carry ethanol, which smells alcoholic, ethereal. The science ↓

Chocolate Caramels

Ingredients

Directions

Make the caramel

  1. Boil the milk in a saucepan.

  2. Stir in the softened chocolate until well combined.

  3. Add the sugar and molasses, then boil until very thick, being careful not to burn it.

Set and cut

  1. Pour the mixture onto buttered tins.

  2. When nearly cold, cut into squares.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  2. Chocolate + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Milk + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  4. Milk + sugartop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

  5. Milk + molassestop 21% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together7,243 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

Milk and sugar barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Milk
Adds dairy fat and liquid that make the caramel rich and creamy.
Chocolate
Adds deep chocolate flavour and fat that softens the texture.
Sugar
Sweetens the mixture and thickens into a firm caramel as water evaporates.
Molasses
Adds moisture, colour and a deeper, treacle-like flavour.

The step that matters

Boil until very thick without burning. As water evaporates, the sugar concentrates and sets firm when cool. Stopping too early leaves the caramels soft and sticky, while too much heat burns the sugars, giving a bitter taste and dark, harsh flavour.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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