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Drink

How We Cook in Tennessee

A group of old drink recipes from a Tennessee cookbook, including several chocolate drinks and lemonades.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Jackson (Tenn.). First Baptist Church. The Silver Thimble Society · From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 18 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 ↓

How We Cook in Tennessee

Ingredients

Directions

Make the chocolate drink

  1. Let milk come to a boil and pour slowly into cup, stirring until dissolved.

  2. Dissolve six tablespoons grated chocolate in one quart boiling water. Boil fifteen minutes. Add one quart sweet milk. Sweeten to taste. Serve hot.

  3. Scrape fine one square Baker's chocolate. Add two tablespoons sugar and put in a saucepan with a tablespoon hot water. Stir over a hot fire for a few minutes, or until perfectly smooth and glossy.

  4. Stir it all into a quart of boiling milk, or half milk and half water. If wanted richer, take twice as much sugar, chocolate and water.

Make the pineapple lemonade

  1. Pare and grate a ripe pineapple. Pour over this the juice of five lemons.

  2. Make a syrup of one pint granulated sugar and one pint water boiled together ten minutes. Mix and add one quart water and strain through cheesecloth.

  3. Keep for months in a cool place if put there. When serving, pour over crushed ice and put a maraschino cherry in each glass.

Make the lemon syllabub drink

  1. Take the grated rind of one lemon and the juice of two. Strain and add two cups granulated sugar. After the sugar is thoroughly dissolved, add a small wineglassful of white wine. Stir into this mixture, slowly, one quart of boiling milk. Strain through a fine wire sieve. Let cool, and place on ice until thoroughly chilled.

  2. To one whole egg add one tablespoonful of cold water. Beat thoroughly. Add the juice of half a lemon and one or two teaspoonfuls of sugar. Stir well, pour into a glass, and fill up the glass with more water if necessary.

  3. Put one cup sugar and half pint water in saucepan over the fire. When sugar is dissolved, add grated rind of one lemon. Let the mixture come to a boil.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

443Calories
16 gProtein
22 gFat
46 gCarbs

Counts 5 of 6 ingredients. The other 1 aren't in our nutrition table and add nothing above, so the real totals are higher.

What these numbers assume: 5 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Chocolate1 oz (28g) semisweet155
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Egg1 large egg (50g)78
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Lemonjuice of 1 lemon (48ml)12
Waternot in our table0

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

By Jackson (Tenn.). First Baptist Church. The Silver Thimble Society. 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. 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.

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  3. Milk + lemontop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,053 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + lemontop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together53,532 recipes

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

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

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

Sugar and lemon barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 53,532 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

Chocolate
Provides the main flavour and colour, and melted into milk it gives the drink body.
Milk
Adds creaminess and body, making the drink smooth and rich.
Sugar
Sweetens the drink and balances the bitterness of the chocolate.
Lemon juice
Adds acidity and bright flavour that cuts the sweetness.
Egg
Adds body and a silky texture to the lemon drink when beaten.

The step that matters

Melting the baker's chocolate smooth. Chocolate scraped into hot liquid can seize or turn grainy if not stirred over gentle heat until smooth and glossy. Dissolving it first with sugar and a little water gives an even, glossy base before the milk is added.

Swap the lemon

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

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Coconutfits better
  3. Figfits better
  4. Lemonthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against chocolate, milk, sugar, egg. 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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