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Dessert

Old Fashioned Chocolate Caramels

A confection made by cooking chocolate, sugar, molasses, milk, and butter until it reaches the soft ball stage.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Old Fashioned Chocolate Caramels

Ingredients

Directions

  1. Combine chocolate, sugar, molasses, milk, and butter in a saucepan.

  2. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until the mixture reaches the soft ball stage.

  3. Test the mixture in cold water to check consistency, similar to molasses candy.

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.

  1. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Chocolate + walnuttop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,548 recipes

    Shared aroma: 3-ethyl-2,5-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

  3. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Chocolate
Adds flavor and deep color, and contributes fat that makes the caramel rich.
Sugar
Sweetens and, as it cooks, helps the mixture set into a firm, chewy texture.
Molasses
Adds depth and a darker, slightly bitter sweetness, and helps keep the caramel soft.
Milk
Provides moisture and milk solids that add creaminess and help the caramel turn tan and smooth.
Butter
Adds fat for a smooth, tender texture and a richer mouthfeel.

The step that matters

Cooking to the soft ball stage. Sugar syrup sets according to its temperature, so cooking too little leaves the caramel soft and sticky while cooking too long makes it hard. Stirring constantly prevents scorching on the bottom of the pan, which would give a burnt taste.

Swap the walnut

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

  1. Almondfits better
  2. Peanutfits about as well
  3. Pecansfits about as well
  4. Walnutthe original

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