Why it works: Chocolate and milk are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,128 recipes. Both carry gamma-nonanolactone, which smells coconut, sweet. The science ↓
Cook Book of the Northwest
Ingredients
Directions
Make the tea
Use freshly boiled water, and boil the tea for five minutes in a tin boiler holding about a pint.
Mixed teas are now much used — equal proportions of Oolong and English breakfast tea, or Oolong and Young Hyson.
Make the chocolate
Procure the best chocolate, grate it, and allow for one quart of water and four tablespoonfuls of chocolate; mix, free from lumps, with a little water, and boil fifteen minutes.
Finish the drink
Then add one quart of rich milk, let it boil, grate in a salt-spoonful of nutmeg, and sweeten to taste.
Add cream at the table.
Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)
Counts 4 of 5 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.
What these numbers assume: 4 portions
| Ingredient | Portion assumed | kcal |
|---|---|---|
| Chocolate | 1 oz (28g) semisweet | 155 |
| Milk | 1 cup (244ml) whole | 149 |
| Nutmeg | 1 tsp ground (2.2g) | 12 |
| Salt | 1 tsp (6g) | 0 |
| Water | not in our table | 0 |
One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.
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. See the original page.
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.
-
Chocolate + milktop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,128 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
-
Milk + nutmegtop 15% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together14,685 recipes
Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).
-
Chocolate + nutmegtop 23% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together574 recipes
Shared aroma: linalool (floral, citrus).
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 once melted and boiled into the water.
- Rich milk
- Adds creaminess and softness, rounding out the chocolate's bitterness.
The step that matters
Mixing the chocolate smooth before boiling. Chocolate mixed directly into hot liquid clumps; blending it first with a little water dissolves the cocoa solids evenly, so the drink stays smooth through the fifteen-minute boil.
Swap the nutmeg
How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (chocolate, milk):
- Cinnamonfits better
- Peppermintfits better
- Nutmegthe original
- Gingerfits about as well
Fit is the average pairing score against chocolate, milk. 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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