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Chocolate to Drink

A warm chocolate beverage thickened with corn starch and egg, sweetened with sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Corn and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,955 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓

Chocolate to Drink

Ingredients

Directions

Make the chocolate base

  1. In a pot, combine the shaved chocolate and hot water; stir well until dissolved.

  2. Add the granulated sugar and corn starch, then cook together.

  3. In a separate pot, bring 1 pint of milk to a boil and add it to the chocolate mixture.

Finish and serve

  1. In a bowl, beat the whole egg with ½ cup of boiling water until very foamy.

  2. Pour half of the egg mixture into the bottom of a chocolate pot.

  3. Pour in the chocolate mixture, then top with the remaining egg mixture and serve.

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. Corn + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,955 recipes

    Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Chocolate + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

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

  4. Chocolate + corntop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together987 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  5. Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together88,785 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Chocolate
Provides the main flavour and body of the drink as it melts into the hot water.
Corn starch
Thickens the liquid so the drink feels richer and less watery.
Whole egg
Beaten to a foam and layered on top, adding a light, airy texture.
Granulated sugar
Adds sweetness that balances the bitterness of the chocolate.
Milk
Adds creaminess and body, softening the chocolate's intensity.

The step that matters

Cooking the corn starch with the chocolate. Corn starch only thickens when heated with liquid until it gelatinises. If the mixture is not cooked long enough, it stays thin and can taste starchy.

“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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