Name: Iced Chocolate
Ingredients: hot chocolate; whipped cream; cinnamon; vanilla; maraschino cherry

Why it works: Vanilla and cherry match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 890 recipes. Both carry ethyl cinnamate, which smells sweet, balsamic. The science ↓

Iced Chocolate

Ingredients

Directions

Make hot chocolate and chill it on ice until thoroughly cold.
Before serving, stir in a little whipped cream, cinnamon, and vanilla.
Pour into glasses and top with sweetened whipped cream flavored with vanilla and cinnamon.
Garnish with a maraschino cherry.

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.

Vanilla + cherrytop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together890 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Cinnamon + vanillatop 1% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together5,287 recipes

Shared aroma: 4-methoxybenzaldehyde (sweet, anise).
Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together10,020 recipes

Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).
Cinnamon + cherrytop 6% of all pairs

Smell alikestrong

Cooked together551 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
Chocolate + cherrytop 11% of all pairs

Smell alikemoderate

Cooked together576 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).