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Dessert

Chocolate Blanc Mange

A gelatin-based chocolate mousse made with milk, eggs, sugar, vanilla, and chocolate.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Chocolate Blanc Mange

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Dissolve the gelatin in about ½ cup of cold water and let it stand for 2 hours.

  2. Grate the chocolate finely and dissolve it in a little warmed milk.

  3. Scald the remaining milk.

  4. Beat the egg yolks and sugar together until very light.

Make the custard

  1. When the milk is scalded, add the gelatin, chocolate, eggs, and sugar.

  2. Simmer gently for 15 minutes, stirring constantly.

Mould and chill

  1. Rinse a mold, then strain the mixture as you pour it in.

  2. Set the mold on ice until it is thoroughly chilled.

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 + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Vanilla + chocolatetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Milk + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

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

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 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

Gelatin
Sets the liquid mixture so the mousse holds its shape when chilled.
Chocolate
Gives the mousse its rich flavour and firm, creamy body.
Egg yolks
Thicken the custard and add richness to the mixture.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the other ingredients are dissolved and cooked into.
Sugar
Sweetens the mousse and balances the bitterness of the chocolate.

The step that matters

Simmer gently while stirring constantly. Egg yolks thicken as they heat but curdle if they get too hot, and stirring keeps the mixture even and stops it from scorching on the base of the pan.

“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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