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Drink

Breakfast Cocoa

A hot cocoa beverage made with cocoa, sugar, salt, water, and milk, boiled and frothy.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
By Fannie Merritt Farmer · From a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg) · 5 ingredients
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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 ↓

Breakfast Cocoa

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Scald milk.

  2. Mix cocoa, sugar, and salt.

  3. Dilute with one-half cup boiling water to make smooth paste.

  4. Add remaining water.

Cook and finish

  1. Boil one minute.

  2. Turn into scalded milk.

  3. Beat two minutes, using Dover egg-beater, when froth will form, preventing scum, which is so unsightly. This is known as milling.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

353Calories
9 gProtein
17 gFat
42 gCarbs

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
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Chocolate1 oz (28g) semisweet155
Milk1 cup (244ml) whole149
Sugar1 tbsp (12.5g) granulated49
Salt1 tsp (6g)0
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 Fannie Merritt Farmer. Recipe from a historical cookbook (Project Gutenberg).

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. Cocoa + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together643 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

  2. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

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

  3. Cocoa + sugartop 27% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together956 recipes

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

Sugar and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Cocoa
Gives the drink its chocolate flavour and deep colour.
Sugar
Sweetens the drink and balances the bitterness of the cocoa.
Milk
Adds richness and body, giving a creamier mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Dilute the cocoa, sugar, and salt to a smooth paste. Cocoa and sugar are dry powders that clump and dissolve poorly when dumped into liquid. Wetting them first with a little boiling water lets the particles separate and disperse, so the finished drink is smooth rather than lumpy.

Swap the cocoa

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

  1. Cocoathe original
  2. Almondfits about as well
  3. Chestnutfits about as well
  4. Peanutfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, 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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