Name: Cocoanut Cream Bonbons
Ingredients: 1 cup grated coconut; ½ cup boiled cream; 1 teaspoon lemon extract or vanilla extract; 1 ounce unsweetened chocolate

Why it works: Coconut and chocolate are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,107 recipes. Both carry gamma-nonanolactone, which smells coconut, sweet. The science ↓

Cocoanut Cream Bonbons

Ingredients

1 cup grated coconut
½ cup boiled cream
1 teaspoon lemon extract or vanilla extract
1 ounce unsweetened chocolate

Directions

Make the coconut paste

Mix grated coconut with boiled cream until it forms a paste.
Flavor the mixture with lemon or vanilla extract.
Shape the mixture into small balls.

Coat and finish

Dip half of the balls into white cream.
Melt the unsweetened chocolate and mix with enough cream to sweeten it.
Dip the remaining balls into the chocolate cream mixture.

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.

Coconut + chocolatetop 9% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,107 recipes

Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
Cream + chocolatetop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together5,466 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).
Coconut + lemontop 13% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,233 recipes

Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).
Coconut + creamtop 18% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together1,223 recipes

Shared aroma: delta-dodecalactone (sweet, creamy).
Cream + lemontop 30% of all pairs

Smell alikelow

Cooked together15,640 recipes

Shared aroma: acetic acid (sour, vinegar).

Cream and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 15,640 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

Grated coconut: Provides the bulk and chewy texture of the bonbon filling.
Boiled cream: Binds the coconut into a paste and adds richness and moisture.
Unsweetened chocolate: Gives the coating its chocolate flavor and color once mixed with cream.