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Chocolate Caramels

Chocolate caramels made from chocolate, brown sugar, water, butter, lemon juice, and vinegar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Chocolate and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,404 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Chocolate Caramels

Ingredients

Directions

Make the caramel

  1. Combine grated chocolate, brown sugar, cold water, butter, lemon juice, and vinegar in a saucepan.

  2. Boil over high heat until the mixture reaches a brittle stage. Do not stir; shake the pan gently while boiling.

Set and cut

  1. Once done, pour into a buttered and floured dish.

  2. Cut into squares while still soft.

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Sugar + vinegartop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together20,806 recipes

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

  3. Butter + lemontop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,227 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-hexenal (apple, fruity).

  4. Chocolate + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,543 recipes

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

  5. Egg + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together118,967 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

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

What each ingredient does

Brown sugar
Provides the bulk of the sweetness and the caramel flavour as it cooks.
Grated chocolate
Adds chocolate flavour and richness to the caramel.
Butter
Adds fat, giving the caramel a softer, richer texture.
Acid vinegar
Adds acidity that helps prevent sugar from crystallising into a grainy texture.

The step that matters

Do not stir while boiling. Stirring a boiling sugar mixture can encourage crystals to form, which makes the caramel grainy. Gently shaking the pan keeps it smooth while it reaches the target stage.

Swap the lemon

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chocolate, sugar, egg, butter, vinegar):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Raspberryfits better
  3. Strawberryfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chocolate, sugar, egg, butter, vinegar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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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