Why it works: Cocoa and milk work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 643 recipes. Both carry methyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓
Cocoa-ntit Bread Ob Bolls
Ingredients
Directions
Heat the milk slowly in a saucepan.
Simmer gently for about 45 minutes without reducing the quantity significantly.
Remove from heat and let it cool slightly.
Strain the milk through a fine sieve or cloth, pressing to leave the nut dry.
Use the warm milk with yeast and flour as you would for common bread.
Alternatively, blend the grated nut with the flour before adding moisture.
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.
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Cocoa + milktop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together643 recipes
Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).
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Milk + flourtop 14% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together78,219 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
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Cocoa + flourtop 22% of all pairsSmell alikelowCooked together386 recipes
Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).
Milk and flour barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 78,219 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
Swap the cocoa
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, flour):
- Almondfits better
- Milletfits better
- Chestnutfits better
- Cocoathe original
Fit is the average pairing score against milk, flour. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.
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