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Dessert

Chocolate Filling

A sweet chocolate filling made with brown sugar, milk, chocolate, cream of tartar, butter, cream, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Chocolate Filling

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a saucepan, combine brown sugar, milk, chocolate, and cream of tartar.

  2. Cook over medium heat until the mixture forms a ball when dropped in cold water.

  3. Remove from heat and stir in butter.

  4. Beat in cream and flavor with vanilla until thick.

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. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Brown sugar
Provides sweetness and molasses flavour, and helps set the filling's texture.
Milk
Supplies liquid that dissolves the sugar and forms the base of the filling.
Unsweetened chocolate
Gives the filling its chocolate flavour and deep colour.
Cream of tartar
Adds acidity that helps keep the sugar smooth and prevents crystallisation.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth, rich mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Cook to the soft-ball stage. Cooking the sugar mixture to the soft-ball stage sets the final texture. Undercooking leaves the filling runny, while overcooking makes it grainy or hard once it cools.

“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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