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Dessert

Chocolate Cream Custard

A custard made with milk, chocolate, eggs, sugar, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 Cream Custard

Ingredients

Directions

Make the custard

  1. Boil 1 quart of new milk in a saucepan.

  2. In a separate bowl, mix ½ cup cold milk with 2 ounces of grated chocolate.

  3. Add some of the boiling milk to the chocolate mixture.

  4. Pour the mixture back into the saucepan, stirring constantly.

  5. When heated through and just coming to a boil, add 6 beaten egg yolks and 1 cup of sugar.

  6. Continue to cook until the mixture thickens.

Prepare the topping and serve

  1. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  2. Fold the vanilla extract into the beaten egg whites.

  3. Reserve some egg whites for frosting if desired.

  4. Pour the custard into serving cups and let cool.

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. Chocolate + vanillatop 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. Chocolate + sugartop 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

Egg yolks
Thicken the custard as they set with heat, giving it a rich, smooth body.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the custard, carrying the chocolate and sugar.
Grated sweet chocolate
Provides the chocolate flavor and color throughout the custard.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and balances the bitterness of the chocolate.
Egg whites
Whipped to stiff peaks to create a light, airy foam for the topping.

The step that matters

Adding the egg yolks to the hot milk. If the yolks are added too hot or cooked too fast, their proteins can scramble and make the custard grainy. Cook gently and stir constantly until it thickens, without letting it boil hard.

“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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